Western Kentucky volleyball head coach Travis Hudson talks with media Sunday, November 29, 2015, during a NCAA Division I women's volleyball bracket reveal party at Overtime Sports Bar and Grill. Western Kentucky faces Arizona on December 4. (Bac Totrong/photo@bgdailynews.com)

Western Kentucky volleyball coach Travis Hudson has plenty on his plate right now.

But it’s still difficult for him to totally wrap his head around his team’s draw for the NCAA Tournament.

The Lady Toppers, ranked 20th in the AVCA coaches poll and 13th in the RPI, will travel to Provo, Utah, to face Arizona in the first round at 6 p.m. CST Friday on the campus of BYU.

“Realistically, I think we should be hosting,” Hudson said. “With an RPI of 13, you know, I actually looked at it today. If you look down the RPIs of the teams that are hosting, it literally goes 1-12, skips 13, then picks up with 14 and 15 right after us. If I’m being honest, I think we should be hosting. We’ve done everything that a team can do to put themselves in that position. We’ve beaten a top-five team. We have 15 wins against the top 100 in college volleyball this year.”

The top 16 teams in the NCAA Tournament field are seeded and picked to host first- and second-round matches. BYU is seeded 13th.

But because the rest of the field after those 16th isn’t seeded, Hudson said some very good teams can end up with some matchups that don’t mesh with their resumes, including his Lady Tops.

“As long as the NCAA Tournament is selected the way it is in women’s volleyball, where they’re really is no seeding outside the top 16, sometimes seasons like we’ve had don’t help you much in terms of your draw,” he said. “Certainly this is one of those years. To be dealt the hand that we’ve been dealt with this Arizona team, it certainly isn’t the caliber of team we’d be playing based on our season if the entire tournament was seeded.”

That being said, WKU (31-3) has preparations well underway for Arizona (19-13), an at-large team from the Pac-12 Conference.

The Lady Tops are trying to win a tournament game for just the second time in program history – and beyond – so Hudson said there’s no time to feel slighted.

“That’s stuff that will probably frustrate me more once it’s over,” he said. “Right now, it is what it is, and we’ve just got to focus on Arizona.”

— Zach Greenwell