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All notes courtesy of SMSU athletics communications.
INDIANAPOLIS - The Southwest Minnesota State University volleyball team is listed No. 5 in the initial NCAA Power Index (NPI) Central Region rankings released on Monday morning.
The NPI is the new metric NCAA tournament teams will be selected in all Division II sports for the 2026-27 season. At-large teams will be selected using the NPI, the system that houses the division's statistical data and objectively applies the selection criteria to the data based on the sport committee's established weighted criteria. NPI will determine the at-large teams selected to the championship after the Automatic Qualifiers (AQ) have been designated.
SMSU, which is 17-3 overall, 11-2 in the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference, ranks No. 12 in the national NPI ranking.
The NSIC, the Great American Conference (GAC), and the Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association (MIAA) make up the 41-team Central Region. There will be eight teams selected per region to make up the field of 64 teams.
Regional competition will be single-elimination, best three-of-five-set matches played on the final campuses of participating institutions during a three-day period. Participating teams will be seeded according to their NPI.
NPI rankings will be announced Oct. 26, Nov. 2 and Nov. 9. NPI rankings will be pushed daily starting with the third ranking (Nov. 2). The NPI rankings used for selections will be posted after the selection show airs on NCAA.com. on Nov. 15 at 9 p.m. (CT).
SMSU, ranked No. 11 nationally, continues conference play this weekend at Minnesota Duluth on Friday and at Bemidji State on Saturday.