That’s what a three match losing streak will do to you, even when two were against top 15 opponents.
As expected following Friday’s loss #13 Kansas, not to mention Sunday’s loss to Western Michigan, YOUR Marquette Golden Eagles volleyball team is no longer a nationally ranked powerhouse. The new AVCA top 25 poll came out on Monday, and yep, the Golden Eagles went from #24 to out of the rankings.
They still earned top 25 votes, though. Marquette snagged 39 points in the polling, which lands them in between UCLA’s 74 and Washington’s 22 to be the unofficial #29 team in the country. I respect the voters who kept MU on their ballots. I’m a little surprised that at least two of them did not vote for Western Michigan as well. One of them might have, the AVCA doesn’t tell you when a team earns just one vote.
We have a new #1 team in the country this week after Texas lost to SMU. It was close, but Pittsburgh came through with 29 first place votes and 1,471 points to beat out Stanford’s 23 top spots and 1,462 points. Why is this particularly notable other than just chatting about the poll? Well, because Marquette’s going to be visiting Pitt on September 22nd and, of course, MU lost to Stanford this past week.
They’re not the only Marquette foes in the top 10 either. Wisconsin slipped two spots to #8 this week, while Creighton moved up two spots to #9. Kansas missed a top 10 spot by 48 points, ending up at #11 behind Kentucky at #10.
We can fold Marquette’s upcoming schedule into addressing the last two teams on the schedule that are earning votes this week. Western Kentucky dropped a bit this week but got at least two ballots to combine to give them three points, while Dayton dropped two spots to #24. Marquette heads down to Bowling Green this coming weekend to face WKU on their floor on Friday morning before staying in town to tangle with the Flyers on Saturday afternoon.
You can check out the entire top 25 right here.