Season Preview: Michigan State

Location: East Lansing, MImsu-logo

NCDA Region: Michigan

2014-2015 Record: 17-18

National Tournament Finish: Lost to SVSU in the Quarterfinals

2015-2016 Captains: Colin O’Brien – C, Alex Zajac – A, Kameron Caldwell – A

Returning Varsity Players: 14

Players to Watch: Colin O’Brien, Kameron Caldwell, Noe Galaviz, Wes Peters Continue reading “Season Preview: Michigan State”

BOTM: 2015 April

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Our final Baller of the Month for the 2014-2015 season goes to a cornerstone of the Grand Valley State University dynasty, Dylan Fettig. Dylan has been apart of this club since 2010, the final year of Grand Valley’s four year streak of winning the National Championship and had the pleasure of ending his career with another one. What might be a surprise to many is that this is Dylan’s first Baller of the Month award. Read what this All-American has to say: Continue reading “BOTM: 2015 April”

NCDA 2015 All-American Team

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What a year of Dodgeball we had. The regular season was full of massive tournaments with turnouts from all over the nation, upsets left and right and a very even field of competition that has not happened in a long time. As usual, the most anticipated event of the year was Nationals, hosted by the fine members of Western Kentucky University. As expected, they did a fantastic job of filming and keeping to the schedule. Along with that, Nationals was full of close games and upsets that shocked many members throughout the league, thus making it a very exciting weekend. After we all had some time to gather our thoughts and get caught up with school, each member team and 3 primary officials were given a weeks time to send in a roster of 15 players that they believe should be on this year’s first ever “All-American” team. A total of 10 teams and 2 of the 3 officials selected sent in their list to comprise our All-American team.

Congratulations to the following individuals:

Continue reading “NCDA 2015 All-American Team”

Jacob Leski’s MDC Preview with Predictions

MDC TrophyAt the beginning of each season, every Michigan team has two goals in mind, one is obviously to win Nationals, but the other is to win the Michigan Dodgeball Cup, considered by many to be the most competitive tournament all season long. If you are looking for heated competition all day long, then I highly recommend you attend this tournament on good ole Valentine’s Day.
Continue reading “Jacob Leski’s MDC Preview with Predictions”

SVSU Never Forgets

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I don’t know about you, but the minute I joined Central Michigan’s Club Dodgeball team a few years back, I discovered not only a great group of friends, but a family. Anytime one loses a member of their family, it tears their world apart. Death has a tendency to come out of nowhere and take us by surprise, thus making the loss of someone we love even more difficult. The real challenge is overcoming that loss and honoring their memory. Continue reading “SVSU Never Forgets”

The Chicago Dodgeball Open Preview

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Other than the Super Bowl, there will be one other exciting sports competition taking place and that is the Chicago Dodgeball Open. Teams attending this round-robin are Depaul (1-3), UWP (2-0), Central Michigan (18-6), and GVSU (22-0) respectively. While CMU and GVSU played each other 3 times last semester, there are new matchups taking place thanks to UWP, who is coming off of an impressive 2-0 record against Nebraska and North Texas. Both GVSU and UWP have yet to lose a game yet, whether one of them comes out of this weekend still undefeated is a story in itself. Continue reading “The Chicago Dodgeball Open Preview”

Buckeye Invite Preview

On Sunday November 9th, seven teams will attend the Buckeye Invite in Columbus, Ohio at OSU’s RPAC. The teams in attendance come from all over the Midwest. Making the long drive from Michigan are Michigan State who is only expecting to bring 11 players and Central Michigan who is bringing a fairly young squad due to many starters not being able to make the long journey. From Kentucky, Western Kentucky and the Wildcats will both be bringing full squads, not something teams are used to seeing out of WKU. From Ohio, the Buckeyes will have their full squad in attendance. Kent State will be attending the tournament as well, hoping to make a statement. And the seventh team in attendance will be NCDA newcomer Akron, who are excited to play their first inaugural matches in team history. Due to the large amount of teams in attendance, not every team will be playing each other, which is why there will be a fairly large amount of interesting match-ups this Sunday.

Tournament Schedule:

OSU: UK, MSU, Kent and WKU

Kent: Akron, WKU, OSU, CMU

Akron: Kent, UK, CMU, MSU

WKU: MSU, Kent, CMU, OSU

UK: OSU, CMU, Akron, MSU

MSU: WKU, OSU, UK, Akron

CMU: UK, WKU, Akron, Kent

Continue reading “Buckeye Invite Preview”

BOTM: October

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October’s Baller of the Month goes out to Western Kentucky’s Captain Nick Johnson. Nick just recently led his team to a victory over the University of Kentucky for the 1st time in over 4 seasons. Nick is also the director of this year’s national tournament in Bowling Green, Kentucky, which we talk about in detail. Tune into my interview with him and his thoughts on this season so far.

Jacob Leski: Nick, congratulations on being selected as Baller of the Month, how does it feel to finally beat Kentucky for the first time in over 4 years?
Nick Johnson: It feels amazing, this win means so much to the team and myself. With a young team we were really needing a win and no one better to get that from than Kentucky. Kentucky is a good solid team, and they have had our number and no matter what we did we could not beat them til now. Losing the first point and being able to pull together to get the win was just an indescribable feeling. Outside of Nationals, during the regular season we have only beaten teams that we were supposed to beat, but we finally beat a team that many thought we couldn’t and before this match we had only scored one point. So we were able to get a good win and score some points and as a captain I could not have been more proud of my team.

Continue reading “BOTM: October”

Season Preview: DePaul

Location: Chicago, Illinois

NCDA Region: Illinois

2013-2014 Record: 2-21

National Tournament Finish: Lost to Kent in the first round

2014-2015 Captains: The Blue Demons will be led by Sam Murphy and Austin Downsdepaul-logo

Returning Starters: They return just about everybody.

Players to Watch: Sam Murphy, Austin Downs and Niko Nodal Continue reading “Season Preview: DePaul”

Central Michigan Invite Predictions

Teams Attending: Central Michigan, Michigan State, Grand Valley State, Ohio State, Bowling Green State, Kentucky and Western Kentucky. 

These predictions were made by Kevin Bailey and myself…

Central Michigan: 4-0 

CMU will be playing all 4 out of state teams this Saturday. Due to CMU returning every one of its starters from last year, they have a strong advantage against every team they will face due to their talent level and strong team chemistry. Of their 4 matches, their most intriguing matchup will be with Ohio State, who returned many of their starters and with Kentucky, who knocked CMU out of Nationals last season.

Grand Valley: 4-0

Due to Grand Valley’s recent success on the court, it is hard to believe that they won’t go 4-0 this Saturday when they play OSU, MSU, BGSU and WKU. Although they are only returning 10 of their starters from last year, GVSU has a large JV pool they pull from each year which is certainly one of the reasons why they are able to restock their lineup year after year. Their most intriguing matchup will be against MSU. The two had close matchups all of last season, lets hope it’s just as competitive as it has been in years past. Continue reading “Central Michigan Invite Predictions”

Season Preview: Grand Valley State

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Location: Allendale, MI

NCDA Region: Michigan

2013-2014 Record: 32-1

National Tournament Finish: Won it all.

2014-2015 Captains: Kevin Bailey – C, Dylan Fettig – A, Aaron Terenzi – A

Returning Starters: 10

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Aaron Terenzi will look to help lead this team to another National Championship as a first year Assistant.

Continue reading “Season Preview: Grand Valley State”