INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. – On Monday night, 15
th-ranked Concordia-St. Paul earned a spot as the seventh seed in the Central Region Tournament as the NCAA released the 2021 NCAA Division II Volleyball Tournament bracket. CSP will face seventh-ranked and second-seeded St. Cloud State in the first round on Thursday, Dec. 2 at 2:30 p.m.
The Golden Bears, along with the rest of the field, will travel to Warrensburg, Mo. as Central Missouri was named the top seed and host of the tournament. CSP will be making their first ever trip to Warrensburg, Mo.
CSP maintained the seventh spot as they earned the final at-large spot in the region field.
The Golden Bears have made it into the NCAA Tournament field in all 18 seasons under head coach
Brady Starkey and have won 11 Central Region titles during that span. CSP has gone 71-8 all-time in the NCAA Tournament and has collected nine NCAA Division II National Championships, with seven in a row from 2007-13 before claiming two more in 2016-17.
The tournament field includes three NSIC schools as well as four teams from the MIAA and the automatic qualifier from the GAC. Concordia is joined by second-seeded St. Cloud State, who earned the NSIC's auto-bid as the conference tourney champions, and fourth-seeded Winona State to represent the Northern Sun.
Central Missouri earned the automatic bid in the MIAA by winning their conference tournament and locking up the top seed in the NCAA regional. Along with UCM, third-seeded Northwest Missouri State, fifth-seeded Washburn and sixth-seeded Nebraska-Kearney make the field from the MIAA. Rounding out the field is Arkansas Tech as the Golden Suns won the GAC Tournament title in five sets over Oklahoma Baptist to claim the automatic bid as the eighth seed. Seven of the eight schools currently rank inside the top-15 in the AVCA Poll with Arkansas Tech the lone team not in the top-25.
Concordia's meeting with St. Cloud State will be the 32nd in the all-time series as the Golden Bears hold a 29-2 record in previous meetings. The two teams met back on Oct. 1 as Concordia claimed a four-set win in St. Cloud. Their only previous postseason meeting came back on Nov. 24, 2019, with CSP sweeping SCSU in the NSIC Tournament Championship match.
2021 NCAA Central Region Tournament quarterfinal pairings
Quarterfinals, Thursday, December 2 – Warrensburg, Mo. (Multipurpose Building)
12 p.m. - No. 3 Northwest Missouri State (26-5) vs. No. 6 Nebraska-Kearney (25-6)
2:30 p.m. - No. 2 St. Cloud State (27-4) vs. No. 7 Concordia-St. Paul (22-8)
5 p.m. - No. 4 Winona State (28-4) vs. No. 5 Washburn (26-5)
7:30 p.m. - No. 1 Central Missouri (28-3) vs. No. 8 Arkansas Tech (22-7)
Semifinals, Friday, December 3 - Warrensburg, Mo. (Multipurpose Building)
5 p.m. - SCSU/CSP winner vs NWMSU/UNK winner
7:30 p.m. - UCM/ATU winner vs WSU/WU winner
Championship, Saturday, December 4 - Warrensburg, Mo. (Multipurpose Building)
7 p.m. - Semifinal winners
