Following the conclusion of the NCAA Men’s Tournament and season, we, here at VolleyMob, have determined our first inaugural collegiate men’s Dream Team. Our selections are exclusive to who we believe would make the best starting line-up, including a libero, along with a second and third string line-up to follow.
TJ DeFalco, Sophomore Outside Hitter at Long Beach State
- Led LBSU with 419 kills
- AVCA Division I-II National Player of the Year
- Added 33 aces, 178 digs and 75 blocks to his tally
- Ranked eighth nationally with a .389 hitting percentage
Nicolas Szerszen, Senior Outside Hitter at Ohio State
- Led Ohio State with 440 kills
- Led the nation with 75 aces and .064 aces per set
- Ranked seventh in the nation with a .389 hitting percentage
Jake Langlois, Senior Outside Hitter at BYU
- Led BYU with 351 kills
- Posted 52 aces, 129 digs, and 63 blocks
- Ranked sixth in the nation with 0.55 aces per set.
Stijn van Tilburg, Sophomore Opposite at Hawaii
- Led Hawaii with 404 kills
- Recorded 115 digs and 66 blocks
- Ranked third in the nation with 4.25 kills per set
Jeff Jendryk, Junior Middle Blocker at Loyola-Chicago
- Posted 226 kills on a .431 hitting percentage
- Ranked seventh in the nation with 1.16 blocks per set
- Recorded 122 blocks on the year
Andrew Sato, Senior Libero at Long Beach State
- Picked up a team-best 254 digs
- Ranks eighth in the nation with 2.44 digs per set
Christy Blough, Senior Setter at Ohio State
- Dished out 1,145 assists
- Ranked fifth in the nation with 10.41 assists per set
- Added 20 aces, 130 digs and 44 blocks to his tally
Check out all three teams of the VolleyMob Dream Team Selections below:
| Men’s First Team | ||
| TJ DeFalco | Long Beach State | OH |
| Nicolas Szerszen | Ohio State | OH |
| Jake Langlois | BYU | OH |
| Stijn van Tilburg | Hawaii | RS |
| Jeff Jendryk | Loyola | MB |
| Andrew Sato | Long Beach State | L |
| Christy Blough | Ohio State | S |
| Men’s Second Team | ||
| Jabarry Goodridge | NJIT | OH |
| Ryan Coenen | Lewis | OH |
| Josh Tuaniga | Long Beach State | S |
| Chris Nugent | Penn State | OH |
| Amir Lugo-Rodriguez | Long Beach State | MB |
| Larry Tuileta | Hawaii | L |
| Miles Johnson | Ohio State | RS |
| Men’s Honorable Mentions | ||
| Matt Szews | Ball State | RS |
| David Wieczorek | Pepperdine | OH |
| Scott Stadick | UC Irvine | MB |
| Evan Enriques | Stanford | L |
| Leo Durkin | BYU | S |
| Jake Arnitz | UCLA | OH |
| Lucas Yoder | USC | OH |
I’d go with Jennings Franciskovic over of Leo Durkin, but both are great setters.
Berry808 – we actually had that exact conversation when putting this list together. Jennings definitely put up a way more rounded stat-line this season (he hit over .500, had 83 blocks including 17 solo…but we gave a subjective bump to Durkin in that he played without Patch most of the year and still ranked 6th in the nation in assists/set. Something about that spoke to us, though there’s a strong argument in either direction.