The No. 1-ranked Long Beach State men’s volleyball team now turn their attention to the postseason, where the true goal of their season has always loomed: a national title.
The 49ers will need to win four matches to make it happen. They host the Big West Tournament this week with the semifinals on Friday and the Finals on Saturday. Two weeks after that will be the NCAA Tournament at UCLA’s Pauley Pavilion.
“We hope it will be a big crowd, I hope the community will come out in droves,” said Knipe.
The way the seedings break down, fans could end up with better matches in the Pyramid than at the actual NCAA Tournament. All the favorites won on Thursday, so Long Beach State will face CSUN on Friday at 7:30 p.m. while fans will be treated to a battle of two of the top five teams in the nation in the 5 p.m. semifinal with Irvine and Hawaii meeting up. That match would be high-intensity since it would in all likelihood decide which team nets an NCAA at-large should they fail to win the tournament.
Then Saturday evening at 7 p.m., the winners of the two semifinals would play for the first ever Big West Tournament championship, and the conference’s automatic NCAA bid.
