4/11/26
Two months ago, we told you about a team playing for something bigger than themselves. A team facing the end of their program, given one final season to write their story. A team that looked at adversity and decided there was only one thing to do. Win the whole thing. On Friday night at the Hunter Sportsplex, the New Jersey City University men’s volleyball team took another giant step toward making that dream a reality. With a 3-1 victory over Baruch College, the Gothic Knights claimed the 2026 CUNY Athletic Conference Championship, finishing a perfect 9-0 conference season and punching their ticket to the NCAA Division III Championship Tournament. But this isn’t the end of the story. It’s just the beginning of Act Three.
The Perfect Script
Hollywood couldn’t have written it better. After going 8-0 in conference play during the regular season, NJCU entered the CUNYAC tournament as the top seed. On Thursday night, they dispatched John Jay College 3-1 (28-30, 25-17, 25-15, 25-19) in the semifinal, with Marcus Pardasie delivering 21 kills on a blistering .381 hitting percentage. Amaru Perales added 12 kills hitting .407, while Alex Casais orchestrated the offense with 49 assists.
The victory set up a championship clash with third-seeded Baruch, the defending conference champions who had defeated second-seeded Hunter in their semifinal. After dropping the first set 28-30 to John Jay, the Gothic Knights didn’t lose another set in the tournament.
Friday’s championship performance showcased everything this team has become under pressure. NJCU hit .281 as a team while holding Baruch to a microscopic .040 hitting percentage. The Gothic Knights dominated at the net with 10 blocks to Baruch’s four, and spread the offensive load with five players recording seven or more kills.
Casais, named the tournament’s Most Valuable Player, ran the show with 36 assists while adding four blocks and four digs. Pardasie continued his dominant tournament with 17 kills and 10 digs for his fifth double-double of the season. Perales anchored the defense at the net with a match-high six blocks. Solomon Brown and Victor De Souza each contributed eight and seven kills respectively, showing the depth that has made this team so dangerous.
The opening set established the tone. NJCU jumped to a 7-1 lead and never looked back, closing out 25-15. The second set stayed tight until 13-13, when a Baruch service error sparked a 5-0 run that put the match firmly in the Gothic Knights’ control. They won 25-19.
In the third set, NJCU appeared ready to complete the sweep, building a 23-19 lead. But Baruch, the defending champions, showed their championship mettle with six straight points to steal the set 25-23 and extend the match.
Here’s where champions are defined. Lesser teams fold after blowing a four-point lead. Lesser teams let doubt creep in. Lesser teams think about what they might lose.
This NJCU team isn’t a lesser team. Not anymore.
The fourth set was a masterclass in composure. Tied 7-7, the Gothic Knights ripped off a 7-2 run and never relinquished control. When Baruch committed a service error at 24-19, the celebration erupted. Conference champions. Perfect conference record. NCAA tournament bound.
“We could not have had a better storybook ending to this season,” head coach Carlo Edra said afterward. “We get to celebrate this weekend and then it is back to work on Monday to compete in the National Tournament. We are going dancing!”
Except it’s not the ending. Not yet.
The Brotherhood Grows Stronger
What has defined this Gothic Knights team all season isn’t just talent, though they have plenty of that. It’s unity forged in the furnace of shared purpose.
These young men know their program ends in July. They know their coach will be out of a job. They know that recruits who committed to NJCU will never suit up in Gothic Knight jerseys. They know they’re not playing for next year’s ranking or building toward something down the road.
They’re playing for right now. For each other. For Carlo Edra. For every player who wore the jersey before them. For the New Jersey volleyball community that has supported them. For the chance to prove that their program didn’t die because it wasn’t good enough.
Two months ago, we challenged them to make this season count. To leave everything on the court. To show that financial spreadsheets can’t measure the worth of young men united by a cause greater than themselves.
They’ve answered that challenge and then some.
The 9-0 conference record. The CUNYAC Coach of the Year award for Edra. Three players named All-Conference First Team (Casais, Pardasie, and Perales). A regular season that saw them perfect in conference play while building chemistry and resilience through every practice and every point.
But perhaps most impressively, they’ve done it with the kind of balance and depth that wins championships. On any given night, multiple players step up. Against John Jay, it was Pardasie with 21 kills. In the championship, five different players had seven or more kills. Casais has been the maestro, averaging double-digit assists and playing all-around volleyball that earned him tournament MVP honors. Perales has been a force at the net on both sides of the ball.
This isn’t a one-man team. It’s a brotherhood playing for something bigger than individual glory.
The Hunter Connection
But there’s another layer to this story that makes Friday night’s championship even more profound. A layer that speaks to fate, to full circles, to the kind of poetry that only sports can write. The championship was played at the Hunter Sportsplex. Hunter College. The same gym where, years ago in 2009, he faced the darkest moment of his professional and personal life. Edra received the news that would change his life forever. His father had passed away.
The grief was crushing. The pain unbearable. Every instinct told him to leave, to be with his family, to process a loss that no son is ever prepared to face. But Carlo Edra is cut from different cloth. His Father’ funeral was that morning. He coached in same suit that he eulogized his father hours earlier. And somehow, through tears and heartbreak that his players could see but perhaps couldn’t fully comprehend at the time, he guided his team to a comeback victory after losing the first two sets. It remains the most emotional win of his coaching career. Not because of the score. Not because of the opponent. But because in the darkest moment of his life, volleyball gave him something to hold onto. His team gave him purpose. The match gave him a reason to keep going when everything inside him wanted to stop. “That was the hardest day of my life,” Edra shared recently. “I’ll never forget that match. I’ll never forget that gym.”
Now, years later, Carlo Edra returned to that same court. To that same gym where he coached through unspeakable grief. But this time, he wasn’t fighting just to get through the day. He was fighting for a championship. For his players. For the program he built from the ground up, saved, resurrected, and will now say goodbye to forever. When the final point was scored and the championship was won, when his players mobbed each other in celebration, when the trophy was raised and the nets were cut down, Carlo Edra stood in that gym where he once coached with an angel on his shoulder. His father wasn’t there to see it. But you have to believe he was watching from somewhere. You have to believe he saw his son return to the place where grief almost broke him and turn it into a place of triumph. You have to believe he was proud.
Full circle doesn’t begin to describe it.
This Story Isn’t Over
The CUNYAC championship is a monumental achievement. A perfect conference season. A tournament title. An NCAA tournament berth. For most programs, this would be the crowning achievement of a great season. But this isn’t most programs. This is NJCU’s final season. This is a team that set out to win the whole thing. And while the conference championship proves they belong, it’s not the whole thing. Not yet.
The NCAA Division III Championship Tournament looms. On Monday, April 13, the Gothic Knights will learn their seeding and their path through the bracket. They’ll find out which teams stand between them and the ultimate prize. They’ll discover whether their storybook season gets to continue writing chapters or whether reality sets in and the dream ends.
But here’s what we know about this team: They don’t fold under pressure. They don’t back down from challenges. They’ve spent an entire season playing with the weight of finality on their shoulders, and it hasn’t crushed them. It’s made them stronger. They’ve already proven the doubters wrong. They’ve already shown that a program deemed “not financially sustainable” can win championships. They’ve already demonstrated that young men united by purpose can achieve remarkable things.
Marcus Pardasie, the junior outside hitter who has been dominant all season, will bring his All-Conference talent to the national stage. Alex Casais, the senior setter who orchestrates everything, will get to run his offense against the nation’s best. Amaru Perales, the senior middle blocker who earned All-Conference honors with his defensive prowess, will anchor the net one more time. Solomon Brown, Victor De Souza, Matt Peralta, and the entire roster will get their chance to show the country what New Jersey volleyball is all about.
And Carlo Edra, the coach who bled Gothic Knight green as a player, who built this program twice, who coached through the loss of his father and now coaches through the loss of his program, will get to dance on the national stage one final time.
The script writes itself. The underdog program in its final season. The coach with nothing left to lose and everything to prove. The players who refused to let their program die quietly. The championship run that started with a challenge to “win the whole thing” and has already delivered one trophy. Two months ago, we told this team they had one job: Prove that NJCU men’s volleyball didn’t die because it wasn’t good enough. They’ve proven that and more. But the job isn’t finished.
The NCAA tournament is where legends are made. It’s where Cinderella stories become immortal. It’s where teams that play with nothing to lose and everything to gain can shock the world. This NJCU team has the talent. They have the chemistry. They have the motivation. They have a coach who knows what it means to win when everything else is falling apart. They have the unity that comes from playing for something bigger than themselves. Most importantly, they have belief.
They believe they can win. They believe this story isn’t over. They believe that the program that gave them everything deserves to go out on top. They believe that Carlo Edra deserves to hang one more banner. They believe that sometimes, just sometimes, the good guys win.
On Monday, the bracket will be revealed. The path will be set. The final chapters will begin to unfold.
And when NJCU takes the court in the NCAA tournament, they’ll carry more than just the hopes of their campus. They’ll carry the spirit of every team that’s been told they weren’t good enough. They’ll carry the memory of every program that ended too soon. They’ll carry the love of a coach who lost his father but found strength in his team.
They’ll carry an angel on their shoulder.
The conference championship was Act Two. The celebration was well-earned. But the curtain hasn’t fallen.
Not yet.
Because this team still has one job to do.
Win the whole thing.
We’re going dancing.
The NJCU Gothic Knights will learn their NCAA Division III Championship Tournament seeding and bracket placement on Monday, April 13. Their journey continues. Their story isn’t finished. And the entire volleyball community will be watching to see how this storybook season ends.
Or if it’s just the beginning of something even greater.