November 14, 2023
We are just two months away from the 2024 season starting and most of the Fall activity is starting to wind down with pre-season tournaments. IH continues with their deep dive into opening day rosters and preseason report issuances. We expect to have all teams evaluated by opening day and we will be doing updates on the preseason rankings depending on the information we continue to collect. We are almost at one-third of the teams with reports, and all of these are available for viewing on the website.
We wanted to share some major bullet points of some of our learning thus far. These will be expanded on and separated into a new menu item called “Latest Digs” which are information points from certain teams such as transfers, major players that are not returning, and new prospects. Here are some overview items to take-away:
The transfer of Elmira superstar outside Alberto Mauricio to Juniata is one of the most impactful moves from last season. Mauricio brings his 5 kills/set offensive charge to a Juniata team that was already expecting to be near the top of the rankings. Alberto also brings his defensive skills and serve receive talents with 152 digs and .943 serve receive percentage. The Hawks will be electric this season and battling for the top spot in the CVC as well as in the country.
The Stevens Ducks, last year’s D3 champions, seems to have held on to almost all of their impact players who were scheduled to graduate such as Percy Bickford, Chris Varseveld, Louden Moran, Connor Feulner, and Nathan Lancia. So why not add a solid D1 transfer from St. Frances Brooklyn to the mix along with 7 top freshman prospects. Outside Hitter Jack Hershman is now a Duck and strengthens an already over the top talented team. Based on the initial view of those that were expected to graduate, IH had Stevens dropping to 8th in the nation, but they will jump back up to the top on our end of November update.
The shuttering of the St. Frances Brooklyn volleyball program will have trickle down positivity to several teams who are taking advantage of adding D1 talent to their D3 rosters. The shutdown of Medaille University also signals a trigger on the D3 landscape as many schools are struggling financially. Cabrini was recently purchased by Villanova University and we are still pending word on the launch of their program for 2024. Let’s hope that financial challenges have been cured at NJCU and St. Norbert and they move forward with new energy after dodging some bullets financially. The post pandemic world has not been friendly to colleges and universities admission department and high school demographics of graduating students has been forecasted to be down for the next few years. But overall, Men’s Volleyball continues to grow at an astounding rate, especially considering some of the external circumstances.
Rutgers and Hunter lost some stars to graduation, but both have replenished with some solid transfers and other new players. Both these teams are in the IH top 20 for the preseason. Lucas Blanco will be headed to Rutgers from St. Frances Brooklyn. The 6′ 4″ junior should fit right into a program that lost Andrew Zaleck, Danny Quay and Justin Tuoy. Rutgers has also added three others transfers that can bring immediate impact. Hunter adds D1 St. Francis Brooklyn transfer John Pfluegler (6′ 6″ RS) and LIU D1 transfer Muhammad Mbaye. Plus a few other D3 transfers to deepen the bench for the Hawks.
North Central picks up D1 libero Danny Smithers from Concordia-Irvine. Central is coming off one of their best ever campaigns and we expect them to be right back in the mix for a national championship.
Nice story emerging at Eastern University as their assistant coach joins the team as a grad student. 6′ 9″ Right-side Jarred Barch joins the team, bringing leadership and size to an improving Eagles squad. Barch has 5+ years of experience coaching at Eastern and Lycoming.
Another big impact transfer is Jared Piontowski. He moves from King’s College to Misericordia. The 6′ 10″ right side will complement the big contributions from Anthony DiPalma at outside giving the Cougars a variety of weapons on the attack. Misericordia is much deeper than King’s and we see the Cougars jumping into the top 25.
Wentworth continues to improve their squad and despite losing some productive seniors to graduation have added SFU D1 middle Brandon Dunz as a grad student. 8 new additions to this squad will bolster the potent LaBouliere attack. Wentworth will be part of the D3 elite along with Stevens, Juniata, and SVU.
Cal Lutheran has added D1 LIU transfer Jordan Cooper to their roster. This coupled with various junior college transfers from California has Cal Lut getting a lot of attention in the preseason.
Here are some notable players we do not expect will be back with their college teams this January:
Kyle Radecki (Carthage)
Zach Small (Wabash)
Ben Casler (Bard) Transfers to D1 FDU
Nathan Klimisch (Benedictine)
Jake Chapman (Edgewood)
Vlad Erickson (Concordia Chicago)
Eric Hollenbach (Rutgers)
Joe Huster (Fontbonne)
Ryan Taylor (Fontbonne)
Ben Kayser (Concordia Wisconsin)
Austin Hand (Misericordia)
Chris Naranjo (Kean)
Hank Foglia (Randolph Mason)
Colby Hurdle (UC Santa Cruz)
Mohan Duvvuri (UC Santa Cruz)
We have added a few more teams to our ranking list that have recently come into vision… Averett Cougars (VA), Virginia Wesleyan Marlins (VA), and the Carlow Celtics (Pittsburgh, PA).
Medaille has been removed from our ranking list.
We will continue to have some stupid “Fun” with certain images we post of D3 players and coaches. We always attempt to position our targets as leaders and role models. You never know if you will pop-up in our next attempt.
We honor the newly appointed captains at Randolph Macon below, who we believe are true rock stars… Watch out for the Yellow Jackets this season.
