Men’s Volleyball Coach Donan Cruz has accepted an NCAA Division I job to coach at Ball State. Cruz coached at Grand View College for the past decade and will be the new Head Coach for the Cardinals.

Cruz told KUAM Sports, "Back in April as we were kind of concluding our championship pursuit at Grand View. I received a call from an ok'd friend and kid of expressed some interest in having me go through the application process. That's kind of how it started. We're able to connect with a lot of different things at Ball State which led me to accepting the head coaching position a few days ago."

Coach Cruz holds the title as the Most Winningest Coach in the NAIA with a record of 211-55. He's a 4-time National Coach of the Year at Grand View University. Donan led the Vikings to a 26-0 season this year and went undefeated in the NAIA Men's Volleyball National Championship.

Cruz said, "Any place that you have that much ties and relationships built up. That's probably what I'll miss the most. Having the opportunity to work with a few guys that we recruited from Guam with in 2018 when we won our first National Championship. We had 4 guys with Guam ties, 3 that obviously grew up there. For me growing up in Inarajan all my younger days. To have had the opportunity to share that experience with those dudes was pretty cool."

The Cardinals are a Division 1 program and finished 12-8 on the season and 7-3 at home. Ball State competes in the Midwestern Intercollegiate Volleyball Association conference.

Cruz said, "The Ball State community is unreal. How quickly they embraced the idea of me coming on board. Just the overwhelming support this morning that we received was. My wife and I, our two little ones and a third baby on the way. It just felt really nice to have that sense of welcome. Because I have t down this a ton but it's just nice to be able to tell that from the community."

Donan says a lot of his references were about how he was raised. Family values, discipline and respect. A lot of the conversations weren't about volleyball but more about the sense of diversity.