Nine of the participating schools automatically qualified by winning their respective conference tournaments, while the other eight were given at-large bids by the NCAA Women's Beach Volleyball Committee.

[12] However, with the growing popularity of the collegiate sport, the NCAA agreed to double the field for the 2022 championship,[11][12] adding a 16-team opening knockout round that led into the established eight-team double-elimination bracket.

[13] Along with the expanded field, the qualification process introduced eight automatic bids that teams earned by winning their respective conference tournaments.

The 16-team single-elimination main bracket began on Friday, May 5, with the winning teams advancing to the quarterfinals and semifinals on Saturday, May 6, until a national champion was determined on Sunday, May 7.

[29] Volleyball Magazine's Travis Mewhirter regarded the Bruins as the preseason favorites, writing that they had "the most loaded lineup in the country, top to bottom".

[44] Headed by Stein Metzger for the eleventh year, their senior-heavy[44] roster featured nine returning starters from the team that took third-place at the previous NCAA championship, including 2022 AVCA first-team All-Americans Lexy Denaburg and Abby Van Winkle.

[29] The Bruins recorded 23 dual sweep victories in the regular season,[29] and were coming off their third Pac-12 title despite being upset by Stanford earlier in the double-elimination tournament.

[33] In contrast to UCLA, Mewhirter considered USC somewhat of a preseason "underdog" due to the fact that they had lost all but four of last year's championship-winning lineup,[44] and thus had a less experienced squad that relied on new transfers and freshmen.

[22] They headed to the championship having failed to make it to the Pac-12 final for the first time in program history[46] after losses to California and UCLA.

[22] Volleyball Magazine's Larry Hamel noted that the Horned Frogs' lineup had a lot of depth;[47] their roster featured the 2021 U21 world champion Anhelina Khmil of Ukraine,[44] as well as the returning AVCA first-team All-American Spanish pair of Daniela Alvarez and Tania Moreno who had finished fourth at the 2022 European Championships.

[47] The 2022–23 season saw TCU defeat six-time defending conference champion[48] Florida State en route to their first-ever Coastal Collegiate Sports Association (CCSA) title.

[33] Meanwhile, the three-time national runners-up Seminoles were ranked fourth,[22] with Coach Brooke Niles's program featuring seven returning starters from the previous year.

[44] Despite losing five of their last ten duals, Volleyball Magazine still regarded Florida State as a strong contender for the NCAA title.

[22] Julie Cribbs, chairperson of the NCAA Women's Beach Volleyball Committee, believed that moving the tournament from a double-elimination to single-elimination format could help disrupt the dominance of the sport's perennial powerhouses.

[51] In the first matchup of the day, UCLA recorded their 24th dual sweep of the season by beating A&M–Corpus Christi 3–0 with pair wins on courts No.

[56] Inclement weather delayed the subsequent matches and the last dual scheduled for the day (Hawaii–Loyola Marymount) was postponed to the following morning instead.