Marquette Volleyball Continues To Lurk In The AVCA Top 25

Two things can be true at once. The first thing: After going 2-2 over the past week with two wins against unranked teams and two losses against ranked teams, Marquette volleyball lost some of the votes that they had in last week’s AVCA top 25 poll.

The second thing: After going 2-2 over the past week with two wins against unranked teams and two losses against ranked teams, Marquette volleyball is closer to being in the top 25 than they were in last week’s AVCA top 25 poll.

Last week, Marquette was the unofficial #29 team in the country with 55 points in the polling, and they were 26 points away from the top 25. This week, Marquette is the unofficial #27 team in the country with 34 points, and that put them just 23 points away from the top 25.

There is a catch here, and that comes by way of that #25 ranking. There are actually 26 teams in the rankings this week because both Iowa State and Western Kentucky had 57 points. That makes them both #25 in the country this week. If they had tied at #24, then there wouldn’t be a #25 team this week, but with the tie in the last spot, that’s how you get to 26 teams. That still means Marquette moved closer to the top 25, because if ISU or WKU was one point one way or the other, MU would be sitting at an unofficial #28, and that’s better than #29. All by way of losing out on 21 points from last week’s polling.

Weird!

Wisconsin remains the #1 team on Marquette’s schedule and the #1 team in the country. Going to four sets with Marquette did not slow them down at all as they snagged 62 of 64 first place votes just like they did last week to take the top spot in the rankings.

It was a great week for almost every ranked team on Marquette’s schedule, at least in terms of their poll positioning. Oregon used a win over Marquette to move up one spot to #6, while Pitt did not suffer from losing to Oregon at home and stayed steady at #8. Creighton is knocking on the door of the top 10 after moving up three spots to #11. Tennessee nudged upwards one spot to #14, and Kansas had a big boost, up three places to #17. Purdue is the only ranked team on MU’s schedule to suffer a setback, falling two spots to #19. Dayton continued their rise, going up two spots to #2, and the aforementioned Western Kentucky team jumped back into the top 25 thanks to that tie after sitting in the Receiving Votes area last week.

Marquette returns to action with a pair of home matches this coming weekend. It’s the start of Big East play, so that means Villanova in the McGuire Center on Friday at 7pm Central and Georgetown the very next day at 6pm CT. Both matches will be streamed via FloSports.

You can check out the entire top 25 right here.