Michella Chester | NCAA.com | August 15, 2022

Nebraska, Texas and Wisconsin lead the DI women's college volleyball preseason rankings

College volleyball rankings: Preseason Power 10 for 2022

Nebraska is the No. 1 team in the just-released AVCA preseason college volleyball rankings for 2022. The Huskers get the nod over No. 2 Texas. The Longhorns received 27 first-place votes to Nebraska's 24, but the Huskers beat out the Longhorns in total points.

It's the first time Nebraska leads the preseason poll since 2016. Wisconsin, the reigning national champion, is No. 3, and Louisville and Minnesota round out the top five.

Here is the full AVCA preseason poll with first-place votes in parentheses:

RANK	SCHOOL	TOTAL POINTS	RECORD	PREVIOUS
1	Nebraska (24)	1538	0-0	NR
2	Texas (27)	1528	0-0	NR
3	Wisconsin (12)	1439	0-0	NR
4	Louisville (1)	1317	0-0	NR
5	Minnesota	1251	0-0	NR
6	Pittsburgh	1222	0-0	NR
7	Ohio State	1114	0-0	NR
8	Washington	1102	0-0	NR
9	Georgia Tech	1034	0-0	NR
10	BYU	1009	0-0	NR
11	Kentucky	890	0-0	NR
12	UCLA	791	0-0	NR
13	Purdue	783	0-0	NR
14	Stanford	755	0-0	NR
15	Florida	733	0-0	NR
16	Baylor	645	0-0	NR
17	Illinois	504	0-0	NR
18	Creighton	477	0-0	NR
19	Oregon	392	0-0	NR
20	Penn State	331	0-0	NR
21	Western Kentucky	280	0-0	NR
22	Utah	254	0-0	NR
23	Kansas	219	0-0	NR
24	Southern California	187	0-0	NR
25	San Diego	154	0-0	NR

Others receiving votes and listed on two or more ballots: Washington State 104; Miami (FL) 101; Tennessee 83; Michigan 66; North Carolina 66; Pepperdine 60; UCF 55; Mississippi State 51; Rice 50; Hawai'i 48; Florida State 43; Marquette 40; Ball State 18; Dayton 14; South Alabama 5; Texas State 3; 9 teams mentioned on only one ballot for a total of 44 combined points.

How the AVCA poll compares to our Power 10 preseason rankings

Now for the really fun stuff. Volleyball fans can argue about rankings all day long — let's dive in. The biggest debate of the preseason poll was likely Nebraska or Texas for the No. 1 spot. I had the same dilemma when putting together my preseason Power 10. Both my Power 10, and the AVCA poll have the Huskers first. Nebraska finished 2021 as national runner-up after putting together an incredible season turnaround led by mostly freshmen. Almost all of their core returns, plus they received the highly sought after transfer of All American Kaitlyn Hord. So Nebraska would seem like a shoo-in. I certainly picked them. But, I did make that selection before the news of former Husker Kayla Caffey transferring to Texas.

That loads up the Longhorns lineup even more. In fact, they now seem to be absolutely stacked this year. They have one of the best players in the nation in Logan Eggleston, Asjia O'Neal, now Caffey and transfers Madi Skinner and Zoe Fleck. The fact that the Longhorns received more first place votes, but less total points is extremely interesting. To me, it feels like we have a dead heat for first heading into the season.

Wisconsin and Louisville were flip-flopped in the AVCA compared to my Power 10. I put the Cardinals higher to take into consideration some possible early season growing pains for Wisconsin after losing the trio of Dana Rettke, Lauren Barnes and Sydney Hilley. The Badgers did bring in a lot of transfers as well, though. And three or four feels like good spot for them heading into the season. The Cards also lost Anna Stevenson and Tori Dilfer, but brought back a larger core of experienced vets, in my eyes.

The AVCA has Minnesota, Pittsburgh and Ohio State at No. 6, 7 and 8. Pittsburgh did not even make the top 10 in my preseason rankings. This is a team that finished the 2021 season ranked high, but lost almost the entirety of their scoring from last season. (They will be without Leketor Member-Meneh, Kayla Lund, and Chinaza Ndee). So, I was surprised to see them so high in the AVCA preseason poll.

The Gophers fell in the 5-7 range for me as well, and same thing goes for OSU. I jgave OSU the edge since Minnesota will be without Stephanie Samedy this year.

Washington, Georgia Tech and BYU close out the AVCA preseason poll. The Huskies bring back Claire Hoffman, Marin Grote and Ella May Powell, so No. 8 is a great spot for them. The Yellow Jackets lost considerable players, but bring back first-team All American Julia Bergman, so they made my Power 10 as well.

I did not include BYU in my top 10, whereas the AVCA did. I instead included a UCLA team that brought in two huge transfers in Lauren Forte from Florida and Matti McKissock from Georgia Tech, on top of a young, talented core. I also gave Kentucky the edge over BYU, since they bring back two All Americans in Azhani Tealer and Emma Grome plus Penn State transfer Adanna Rollins. BYU and Pitt would likely be my first out of the Power 10 — two teams that made the AVCA preseason top 10.

The rest of the top 25

Kentucky, UCLA and Purdue are the first three out of the top 10 of the preseason AVCA poll. Purdue likely took the considerable dip after losing a large chunk of its core — Caitlyn Newton, Grace Cleveland, Hayley Bush, Taylor Trammell and Jena Otec. Purdue head coach Dave Shondell made mention of this at Big Ten media days. He knew a lot of people might be counting them out or dropping them to start the season given the players they lost. But — he has a great group of players in the gym, with some now-veteran players led by Emma Ellis, and a strong group of freshmen and names we might not know yet.

Stanford and Florida close out the top 15 at No. 14 and 15, respectively. The Cardinal have one of the toughest, if not the toughest, non- conference schedules in NCAA volleyball to start the season. Watch out for this team to possibly re-establish themselves as a top dog in college volleyball this year. Last season they showed some serious talent on the court with a pretty young group that had not yet had enough time to gel following the shortened Covid-19 season prior to 2021. I am excited to see how they compete in 2022.

Florida will have a big-time non-conference matchup against Wisconsin in the Kohl Center on Sept. 16. So we have a ton of highly ranked, fun, non-conference matchups to look forward to early in the season.

A few other teams to note — Baylor dropped to No. 16 from its 2021 finish with the loss of Yossiana Pressley and crew. Creighton comes in at No. 18 with the return of Norah Sis, Jaela Zimmerman and Kendra Wait.

Penn State starts the season at No. 20 in its first season under new head coach Katie Schumaker-Cawley, Utah comes in at No. 22 with the loss of Dani Drews, and Kansas starts the season at No. 23 after making some noise in the 2021 NCAA volleyball tournament.

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