diff --git a/opal/mca/btl/usnic/btl_usnic_mca.c b/opal/mca/btl/usnic/btl_usnic_mca.c
index 655128fd5f..72c5583f77 100644
--- a/opal/mca/btl/usnic/btl_usnic_mca.c
+++ b/opal/mca/btl/usnic/btl_usnic_mca.c
@@ -236,8 +236,8 @@ int opal_btl_usnic_component_register(void)
                   -1, &cq_num, REGINT_NEG_ONE_OK, OPAL_INFO_LVL_5));
     mca_btl_usnic_component.cq_num = (int32_t) cq_num;
 
-    CHECK(reg_int("av_eq_num", "Number of event queue entries for peer address resolution (-1 = pre-set defaults; depends on number and type of devices available; will error if ac_eq_num < 8)",
-                  -1, &av_eq_num, REGINT_NEG_ONE_OK, OPAL_INFO_LVL_5));
+    CHECK(reg_int("av_eq_num", "Number of event queue entries for peer address resolution",
+                  1024, &av_eq_num, REGINT_NEG_ONE_OK, OPAL_INFO_LVL_5));
     mca_btl_usnic_component.av_eq_num = (int32_t) av_eq_num;
 
     CHECK(reg_int("base_udp_port", "Base UDP port to use for usNIC communications.  If 0, system will pick the port number.  If non-zero, it will be added to each process' local rank to obtain the final port number (default: 0)",
diff --git a/opal/mca/btl/usnic/btl_usnic_module.c b/opal/mca/btl/usnic/btl_usnic_module.c
index d631b283d6..f35ce4ad98 100644
--- a/opal/mca/btl/usnic/btl_usnic_module.c
+++ b/opal/mca/btl/usnic/btl_usnic_module.c
@@ -1895,11 +1895,6 @@ static void init_queue_lengths(opal_btl_usnic_module_t *module)
     } else {
         module->cq_num = mca_btl_usnic_component.cq_num;
     }
-    if (-1 == mca_btl_usnic_component.av_eq_num) {
-        module->av_eq_num = 1024;
-    } else {
-        module->av_eq_num = mca_btl_usnic_component.av_eq_num;
-    }
 
     /*
      * Queue sizes for priority channel scale with # of endpoint. A