WICHITA, Kan. (GoShockers.com) – Wichita State will take on former American Athletic Conference foe SMU on Thursday, December 5 in the First Round of the 2024 NCAA Volleyball Championship. The match is scheduled for a 7:00 pm CT first serve at Moody Coliseum in Dallas, Texas.
The entirety of the First and Second Rounds will be streamed on ESPN+.
Missouri (20-8, 11-5 SEC) and Texas State (22-8, 13-3 Sun Belt) are on the other half of the bracket and will get underway at 4:00 pm CT on Thursday.
The Shockers and Mustangs have a lengthy series history against one another in The American. The two programs have played each of the last seven years since Wichita State joined the AAC in 2017, with SMU holding an 8-6 edge in head-to-head matchups during that range. All time, SMU leads the series 9-8 in a series that dates back to the 1996 season. The Shockers have won three of their last four matches in Dallas, including a series split of last year’s two matches.
The Mustangs are 24-7 overall this season, including a 16-4 mark in ACC play that is good for fourth in the conference. SMU was ranked 10th in the latest AVCA Top 25 poll on November 25 and 8th in the latest RPI, bolstered by wins over top-four national seeds Nebraska and Pittsburgh. SMU middle blocker Natalie Foster played four seasons at Wichita State before transferring to Dallas for her final collegiate season.
Wichita State will be appearing in the NCAA tournament for the 12th time in program history. The Shockers enter the tournament with an 18-13 record (10-6 in the American Athletic Conference) after sweeping through The American Championship, defeating Tulsa, South Florida and Florida Atlantic in straight sets at Charles Koch Arena. Alyssa Gonzales, Morgan Stout and Izzi Strand were named to the All-Tournament team, with Stout earning Most Outstanding Player honors.
The victory represented WSU’s second American Athletic Conference championship and first in a conference tournament. The Shockers won the 2017 regular season title when the conference did not host a tournament. Overall, Wichita State has now won five conference tournaments, with the previous four coming in the Missouri Valley Conference (2004, 2013, 2015, 2016).
