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PARKVILLE, Mo. — Park University’s women’s beach volleyball team has qualified for the 2024 NAIA Women’s Beach Volleyball National Invitational Tournament, as announced by the NAIA yesterday (April 15). The tournament will be held Thursday-Saturday, April 25-27 at the Greeneville (Tenn.) Beach Volleyball Complex.

The Pirates, with a record of 12-5, enter the tournament as the No. 3 team in the country and the No. 3 seed. Park has yet to drop a match against NAIA competition in 2024 as the Pirates losses have all come to NCAA schools, including three Division I teams (University of Nebraska, Missouri State University and Lindenwood University and two Division II teams (Southwest Baptist University and McKendree University. Park is the only school of the eight qualifiers not within 300 miles of an ocean — all other teams are based in Arizona, California, Florida and Oregon — and is one of five schools to have qualified every year of the tournament (2022-24).

Park opens pool play (in Pool B) with two matches on Thursday (April 25) against No. 7 Vanguard University (Calif., 9-15) at 11 a.m., and against No. 6 University of Saint Katherine (Calif., 14-9) at 3 p.m. The Pirates wrap up pool play on Friday (April 26) against No. 2 Ottawa University (Ariz., 18-8) at 9 a.m.

All eight teams advance to the single-elimination bracket play portion of the tournament on Friday with the four quarterfinal matches set for noon (Pool A 3rd vs. Pool B 2nd), 1:30 p.m. (Pool A 1st vs. Pool B 4th), 3 p.m. (Pool A 2nd vs. Pool B 3rd) and 4:30 p.m. (Pool A 4th vs. Pool B 1st). On Saturday (April 27), the national semifinals will be played simultaneously at 10 a.m. with the national championship match at 1 p.m.

Also competing in the tournament are No. 1 Corban University (Ore., 20-3), No. 4 Arizona Christian University (14-13), No. 5 Webber International University (Fla., 18-8) and No. 8 Ave Maria University (Fla., 13-3)

For the uninitiated, in beach volleyball, five two-person teams compete against their respective counterpart (No. 1 vs. No. 1, No. 2 vs. No. 2, etc.). Each match is a best-of-three with the first two sets to 21 and the third set (if needed) to 15 (all sets must be won by two points). The school that is victorious in the majority of the matches against their opponent wins.

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