Home Court Advantage, the Coaches' Poll, & Math!

A really great (and nerdy) conversion with Luke Pekol & Zach Pekol of Lewis University

I was scrolling through social media the other day and something caught my eye. It wasn’t a ridiculous clip from Josh Nekoba. It wasn’t the latest rant from volleyball’s version of Steven A. Smith, Matthew Houlihan. It was a post about a research presentation at the Mathematical Association of America’s summer conference. Yes, I understand how nerdy this sounds and I don’t care.

Juniors Luke Pekol (OPP) and Zach Pekol (MB) of the Lewis University Flyers were these researchers, and I knew I needed to talk to them. It’s not every day that you get a chance to get this nerdy about volleyball. The intersection of volleyball and math is the exact story that I want to cover.

So, I sat down with them, virtually, and we had a great conversation. I hope you enjoy this as much as I enjoyed talked to them.

I am excited to see Zach and Luke on the court this year and also to see where their research takes them. This is just the tip of the iceberg and I hope others join the party. Growing the Game takes a lot of forms, but this summer it looked like mathematical analysis.