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SOUTHFIELD--The Wolverine-Hoosier Athletic Conference tournament champion Lawrence Tech Blue Devils will play in Pool B, with No. 7 Georgetown-Kentucky (24-6) and No. 2 defending national champion Vanguard (14-3), at the 2024 NAIA Men's Volleyball Championship Tournament that will be held Tuesday, April 30 through Saturday, May 4, at Alliant Energy PowerHouse in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

RECORDS: No. 10 LTU (15-14)...No. 7 Georgetown-Kentucky (24-6)...No. 2 Vanguard (14-3), which is the defending national champion.

SCHEDULE: The Blue Devils will open pool play with Vanguard on Tuesday and then play Georgetown on Wednesday. Both matches start at 2 p.m. Eastern (1p Central).

AT FIRST GLANCE: Lawrence Tech comes into the NAIA Tournament on a school-record 10-match winning streak, which includes three five-set victories. The No. 10 national seed works to being the highest ranking ever for LTU Men's Volleyball.

ALL-TIME SERIES: Lawrence Tech and Vanguard will be meeting for the first time. Georgetown leads LTU 2-0, including a 3-0 victory earlier this season on its homecourt in Kentucky. Against the NAIA field, the Blue Devils are 0-4 lifetime.

WELCOME TO THE DANCE: Lawrence Tech gained an automatic berth to the NAIA Tournament--its first appearance in the program's eight-year history--after capturing its first-ever WHAC Tournament title last weekend in Sylvania, Ohio.

WHAC TOURNAMENT REVISITED: The Blue Devils became the lowest seed ever to win the conference tournament, upsetting three higher seeded teams as the No. 5. LTU knocked off 2023 WHAC champion Indiana Tech in four sets in the conference finals on Saturday. Before that, LTU upset No. 13-ranked Lourdes on their homecourt during the WHAC Semifinals. Lawrence Tech started its postseason run with a 3-2 road win at No. 4 seed Mount Vernon Nazarene.

COACH JACOB PAIGE: A two-time LTU graduate, Paige '20 and MBA '24 is in his third season at the helm of his alma mater. He officially holds a school and career record of 42-44 (includes 10 forfeit losses in 2024). In 2023, he led LTU to a 17-11 record and a trip to the WHAC Semifinals--recording the program's first postseason win ever in the process.

AS THE PAIGE TURNS, COACH AT THE MIC: "We are excited and honored to be appearing in our first NAIA Championship in the young history of our men's volleyball program. It's a nice feather in our collective cap knowing that we are one of the top 12 teams in the nation.

"Our guys have worked very hard and persevered against some adversity out of our control to achieve some significant milestones this season. We defeated nationally-ranked teams on several occasions. We had a few student-athletes recognized for national weekly awards. We've broken numerous team and individual records this spring. We won our first-ever WHAC Tournament tile as the lowest seed ever to do so. And now it culminates with a berth to the national tournament.

"It's taken all 21 of our guys to get where we are right now. We have a significant challenge ahead of us in a very tough Pool B field. But we have a tremendous opportunity to continue playing in May when not many teams can say that. We expect to compete, just play volleyball and represent ourselves and LTU with pride."

HONORS, HONORS, HONORS: Lawrence Tech has had a banner 2024 year with student-athletes receiving awards at the national and conference levels...
+ All-WHAC--Redshirt junior outside hitter Brendon Down (Bloomfield Hills, Mich./Siena Heights University), sophomore middle blocker Akram Askoul (Mississauga, Ontario) and freshman outside hitter Mario Cid (Barcelona, Spain/FC Barcelona) on the All-WHAC First Team and sophomore setter Nathaniel Brownlee (Plainfield, Ill./Club VBC) on the second unit gave LTU school records for most first-team conference and overall picks in a single season. Cid also was named to the WHAC All-Freshman Team.
+ NAIA Player of the Week: Askoul became the first LTU men's volleyball player on Feb. 20 to earn NAIA National Defensive Player of the Week. He earned the award a second time on March 11. Graduate student and libero Matheus Andrade (Coronel Fabriciano, Brazil) received NAIA DPOW honors on April 9.
+ WHAC Player of the Week: Askoul also is a two-time WHAC Defender of the Week (Feb. 19 and Mar. 11). Brownlee was the Setter of the Week on Feb. 26 and Apr.1. Andrade was recognized as the WHAC Defender of the Week on April 8.
+ A total of five Blue Devils were academic all-conference standouts.

CID THE KID: Mario Cid has burst onto the collegiate scene with a WHAC-third-leading .305 attack percentage. He also has connected on 255 kills (2.58 kps), 27 service aces for 12th, 55 total blocks and 171 digs.

BRENDON IS DOWN WITH IT: He leads LTU and ranks fourth in the WHAC with 371 kills (3.4 per set). He has averaged a .264 attack percentage (WHAC-8th), 0.61 blocks and 50 aces (WHAC-3rd). Down also is ninth in the conference with 184 digs He smashed a school single-match record 25 kills on March 2 at Mount Vernon Nazarene, a 3-2 victory.

AKRAM IS AS-KOUL ON THE COURT: Askoul leads the conference with 1.09 blocks per set. He owns 23 solo blocks for third in the WHAC. He also has 160 kills with a .271 attack percentage.

DIG THIS: Andrade tops the WHAC with 3.01 digs per set that includes a total of 238--which ranks third in LTU single-season history.

ASSISTS MACHINE: Brownlee has set school records for assists in a single match (61 at Goshen, Feb. 24) and in a season (1,029) with a WHAC-fourth-leading 9.44 per set. He also has 58- and 56-assist matches to his credit.

LAST TIME OUT: The Blue Devils defeated Indiana Tech 21-25, 30-28, 27-25, 25-20 in the WHAC championship match on the Lourdes University campus in Sylvania, Ohio. Down pounded a match-best 25 kills for a school record on a .321 attack percentage to go along with four total blocks. Classmate JT McCarthy flourished with 12 kills (.450) and seven total blocks--both season highs. Brownlee added 52 assists and a match-high 14 digs.

LAST TIME OUT....AGAINST GEORGETOWN: The Tigers prevailed 25-23, 25-11, 25-18 back on March 5. Cid led then-No. 14-ranked LTU with 11 kills, six digs and two total blocks. Freshman Gustavo Machado and Down added eight and seven kills, respectively. Brownlee chipped in 26 assists and Andrade 
matched Cid for the team lead with six digs. But the Tigers outhit the Blue Devils .397 to .169 and also played solid defense keeping more attacks in play with a 31-16 digs advantage. Lawrence Tech did get off to a good start despite losing the opening set by two points, outhitting Georgetown .364 to .333 and almost doubling up the home team in kills (17-10). 

WHAC TEAM RANKS: The Blue Devils are first in kills/set (12.39), assists/set (11.74), points/set (16.3), second in total attacks (3,034), digs (1,109), total blocks (269), points (1,773) and third in solo blocks (91).

OFFENSIVE DEPTH: Freshman Gustavo Machado and McCarthy also have played an integral role in the LTU offense. Machado is second on the team with 2.74 kills per set (258 total) on a .225 attack percentage. He set a WHAC record for single-match hitting percentage of .824 with a match-high 14 kills on 17 swings against no errors against Bethel University on April 12. McCarthy has contributed 143 kills and a .336 attack percentage.

RALLY SCORING: Lawrence Tech this season is 9-2 (not including forfeits) versus teams receiving votes in the NAIA Top-15...the Blue Devils are officially 10-9 in contests away from home, including a 3-3 mark on a neutral floor....LTU posted a 25-4 record on the floor, but were forced to forfeit 10 losses due to an ineligible player...including a current 10-match win streak, LTU has set or tied most team and individual match, season and career records in 2024...the last time the team suffered back-to-back losses on the court occurred March 18/21, 2023, to #13 Indiana Tech, 3-1, and #RV Aquinas, 3-2.