NCAA tourney team returns for more this season

Thursday, January 4

Santa Barbara, Calif.

5:30 p.m.

Grand Canyon

CSUN

Photo by: David Kadlubowski

1/3/2024 8:00:00 AM | Men's Volleyball, Paul Coro

GCU core features Team USA's Gianni, All-America 2nd teamer Hickman

By: Paul Coro

Normal Grand Canyon men's volleyball practice days in Antelope Gymnasium may feel like intense match play in most places.

The action can move as explosively as fireworks, with balls whizzing back and forth in a blur and the competitiveness sparking the fire.

That is the way the Lopes shot high and lit up the national landscape with its first NCAA tournament trip last season. With most of that team's starting lineup back, the practice atmosphere remains how GCU intends to keep bringing oohs and ahhs when its season opens Thursday night at the Asics Invitational in Northridge, California.

The Lopes, coming off their winningest season at 22-8, will begin this campaign with its highest national preseason ranking at No. 7 and have an expectation to be among the nation's top eight for a return NCAA tournament trip in May.

"Our offensive tempo is so fast in our gym that as soon as you go play somebody else, the game is almost slower," said GCU ninth-year head coach Matt Werle, whose teams have gone 128-88. "Mentally, to see things progress and develop, it's like you're coming off the on-deck circle after swinging weighted bats."

GCU is now a heavy hitter on the national scene and should keep swinging for the fences with eight returnees who played in last season's NCAA tournament, when the Lopes won the first set and ended a 3-1 loss with Long Beach State escaping with a 25-23 final set.

Four GCU players who received All-America honors on that breakthrough team are back, including second-teamer Jackson Hickman at outside hitter and honorable mentions Camden Gianni at outside hitter, Nicholas Slight at setter and Rico Wardlow at middle blocker.

"We expect to get there again and even try to improve on where we finished, but I think the standard that we try to hold in our gym is higher," Werle said. "To reach those expectations, we know that it's going to be hard. There may have been teams that have underestimated what we can provide, and that's no longer the case. We have national respect."

That shows in Off The Block placing Gianni, Hickman and Slight on its Preseason All-America second team.

Camden Gianni

Gianni, a 6-foot-5 senior who starred for USA Volleyball in the summer, led GCU in points per set (3.7), and Hickman was tops on the team for kills per set (3.1) while Slight ranked 10th nationally with 10.1 assists per set.

"Camden presents himself like a professional athlete," Werle said. "He's here to get the job done, so he's very businesslike about what he does. He's done a very nice job of doing it all."

Since the start of his career was halted by cardiac arrest during a practice and ensuing open-heart surgery five years ago, Gianni has progressed into a national collegiate figure and is taking on a larger leadership role after partnering last year with departed pin Christian Janke's stability.

"It's just weird because the last season always goes the fastest, and it's already started," Gianni said. "The way this program started and where it's at now, we've had tremendous strides every year.

"People are stepping in and taking initiative to be the players they want to be. There is a lot of depth. Last year, we were more top-heavy with seniority, but this year has a bigger spread between me being the oldest as a sixth-year senior and the freshmen we had last year and this year's freshmen."

Jackson Hickman

Hickman had the biggest breakthrough on GCU's roster last season, going from 75 career kills and four career aces in his first two Lopes seasons to 319 kills and 23 aces last season.

That included the 6-foot-4 Phoenix native's 32-kill effort in two victories against UC Irvine that proved critical to the GCU's at-large NCAA bid.

"Jackson's going to have a bigger target on his back," Werle said of the Boulder Creek High School graduate. "He's going to have a big focus, after being way better than people anticipated. So he's got to back it up this year."

H Nic Slight

ickman's intrinsic connection with Slight keeps them on the same page offensively.

After starting in each of his first two Lopes seasons, Slight showed offseason growth in his game and his maturity to elevate his on-court performance and his ability to orchestrate GCU's attack.

Slight starred two years ago with a career-high 60 assists in a four-set match against Pepperdine and evolved his play through last season's 49-assist performance at the season-ending NCAA tournament loss in Virginia.

"We know Nic's a very flashy and a fun setter to watch, but how he has turned into such a better leader – because that position really needs it," Werle said. "It has gone a long way for our program. He's distributing the ball extremely well, and the tempo is just as fast as it's ever been."

Part of that effort will be to find Wardlow, a 6-foot-7 junior from suburban Chicago, more often in the middle.

In hi Rico Wardlow

s first season at GCU after transferring from Purdue Fort Wayne, Wardlow's .536 hitting percentage would have led the nation if he had reached the qualifying requirement. Needing 3.3 attacks per set, Wardlow averaged 2.9 attacks per set last season.

"We've definitely made that a focus," Werle said. "Even if we knock Rico's hitting percentage down, he's still hitting better than any pins really are going to hit consistently. Even if he has a big block in front of him, Rico is going to find a way to score."

Those star returnees helped GCU rank third nationally with a .344 hitting percentage, resulting in 12.5 kills per set.

This season's big jumper, figuratively and literally, is 6-foot-4 sophomore Cameron Thorne of Hollywood, Florida. In 32 fewer sets than Wardlow last season, he was only two blocks shy of Wardlow for the team lead.

"Coming in as a freshman, he was a very springy, athletic, fun-to-watch guy," Werle said. "Now, he has developed way more shots and discipline, as opposed to just trying to fly and have highlight reel swings. With his blocking, even though he is smaller, he is so quick laterally that he gets those blocks when you don't see him coming."

Another new starter will be junior Cooper Herndon at libero, where 6-foot-3 freshman Matt Thornton is also adapting quickly. Herndon, a 6-foot-1 Dallas native, is going from not playing for his first two years at GCU to being a service substitute last season with 15 digs to taking over for five-year starter Cole Udall.

"Cooper's been on the opposite side of the practice gym from Christian, Camden and all those heavy arms for those past three years, so he's not going to shy away from any aggressive jump servers," Werle said. "He's also one of those guys that is fearless defensively. He will wear a ball in the face and shake it off and laugh about it."

GCU's service game is headed by Gianni, who ranked seventh nationally with 0.5 aces per set. Karter Rogers, a 6-foot-5 junior, also brings a high-toss, topspin serve while 6-foot-5 graduate transfer Jarrett Anderson offers a left-handed look with a long, sweeping slider.

"Jarrett's tempo overhead resembles what Hugo Fischer used to do for us, where we're just chucking balls on a string back flat at him and he terminates them," Werle said.

Junior Jack Palmer, a 6-foot-8 junior, gets a better chance to show his potential after injuring his ankle last season, and Jordan Lucas, a 6-foot-4 sophomore, continues to be an energy injection and libero option.

"We are understanding what it takes to get where we want to go," Gianni said.

Part of what feeds that success is the home environment the program has created with the campus following and the players' community connections. GCU ranked seventh nationally with 904 fans per game, but the Lopes will start this season with nine of its first 11 matches on the road. That begins this week at the Asics Invitational in Santa Barbara, California, where they open Thursday at 5:30 p.m. against No. 17 CSU Northridge before facing UC San Diego on Friday and No. 15 UC Santa Barbara on Saturday.

The Lopes' home-opening set will be Jan. 12 and 14 against Lindenwood, and they will not play there again until Mountain Pacific Sports Federation play is underway for USC's Feb. 13-14 visit. The preseason MPSF poll put GCU in a tie for third with BYU behind UCLA and Stanford.

The Lopes' last season featured a 14-0 start and 20-1 record before a 2-7 finish. Those nonconference wins built the resume of a NCAA tournament team, and getting there will be just as select this season with an eight-team NCAA tourney that will bring six conference champions and two at-large qualifiers to Long Beach, California.

"We don't need to be exceptionally great all the time," Werle said. "We need to be consistently good, and that should provide us an opportunity to win."