CCU volleyball draws Creighton in first round of NCAA tournament

Now in the NCAA tournament for the second year in a row, the next step for the Coastal Carolina volleyball program and its rapidly ascending stature is to get past the opening round.

The Chanticleers gathered Sunday night at Buffalo Wild Wings in Carolina Forest to watch a live stream of the NCAA selection show and learned they will start the tournament against No. 16-seeded Creighton on Friday in Chapel Hill, N.C.

The Chants (25-4) have never advanced past the first round in four prior NCAA tournament appearances, but in the midst of the best season in program history, they have every reason to be confident this week.

“First of all, I’m really happy to be in the NCAA tournament and really pleased with my team how they played this year,” coach Jozsef Forman said. “How far we can go? We will see. Creighton is a really good team, very high ranking, and we will do our best.”

The Chants are rolling with a program-best 18-match winning streak dating back to Sept. 22 – during which they have lost a total of just five sets – and they went unbeaten in Big South play.

Creighton (25-8), meanwhile, is in the NCAA tournament for the fourth straight season and fifth time overall, earning its spot by winning the Big East’s automatic berth.

The winner of the game Friday would face the winner of host North Carolina (20-9) and UNC Wilmington (24-7).

“We’ve been working so hard since day one [and] focusing on winning the first round, so we’re pretty confident,” said sophomore outside hitter Leah Hardeman, who repeated as Big South Player of the Year this season. “I know it will take a lot of work this next week and we just have to get our minds right for the weekend.”

This marks the first time in program history Coastal Carolina has repeated as Big South champions and just the second time the Chants have won both the conference’s regular-season and tournament titles in the same season. Their .862 winning percentage is the best regular-season mark in program history.

Forman, in his fourth season as head coach, has vaulted the Chants further and further each year.

He took over a program that was coming off back-to-back losing seasons, and after going 14-14 in his first season in 2012 he led the Chants to a 19-12 mark in 2013 and now back-to-back 25-win seasons.

“What I like is we focus on the next step,” Forman said. “... We focus on the next step and now this will be Creighton and we will see what happens. During the season always we focused on the next game. We didn’t plan to be undefeated [in the conference]; it just happened. And we are happy for that.”

This story was originally published November 29, 2015 at 11:14 PM with the headline "CCU volleyball draws Creighton in first round of NCAA tournament."