Spring is here, which means that the final wave of NCAA championships is upon us. We already saw men’s volleyball cap an incredible season with an NCAA title, its first since 1997 and Stanford’s first this year. Will the performance of the volleyball team inspire other teams to bring home the hardware too? Let’s see how we stack up in spring championship season.
In an up-and-down season, Stanford looks to be in the mix to make the NCAA field of 64. The team has looked great this year with some big wins and big sweeps, but has not looked so great at times with some tough losses. The hitting and pitching can be described as solid but sporadic—sometimes, great offensive and defensive performances don’t always pair up together. Stanford has the talent to make a run at the College World Series (CWS) but needs to have a strong finish to get favorable seeding for a regional.
The softball team started the season strong but has faded a bit as Pac-10 play has geared up—it is just 6-13 in conference play. This Stanford team is capable of great things, as its 28-4 non-conference record shows. Without great performances, an early NCAA exit looms.
It will be hard for the Stanford track and field teams to make a lot of noise at the NCAA Championships. Sophomore hurdler Amaechi Morton and a pair of distance runners, junior Elliot Heath and sophomore Chris Derrick, will lead the way for the Stanford men. Sophomore pole-vaulter Katerina Stefanidi, junior jumper Arantxa King and senior jumpers Griffin Matthew and Whitney Liehr are national contenders on the women’s side.
One of Stanford’s best chances for another team championship is the women’s water polo team. It is the top seed in the NCAA Tournament that starts today in San Diego, Calif. The team has been solid all year, its only losses coming against USC and UCLA. Luckily, both the Trojans and the Bruins are on the opposite side of the bracket, so Stanford would potentially only have to beat one of them for the title.
Golf
The men’s golf team is seeded first in the Notre Dame/Midwest Regional this weekend. The Cardinal is coming off a meltdown at the Pac-10 Championships last weekend, where Washington overcame a seven-shot deficit on the final day to edge out Stanford. The Cardinal should be able to advance out of its regional, barring any setbacks, which would put Stanford in contention for the NCAA title.
In contrast to the men, the women’s team surged with seven birdies on the final seven holes to claim the sixth of eight spots in the NCAA Championships from its regional. Stanford will be fighting an uphill battle at the NCAAs—it has not had great showings at NCAAs in the recent past.
After getting snubbed from last year’s NCAA Tournament, the Cardinal earned its way in this year and will be playing James Madison tomorrow in the first round. Stanford had to play a play-in-game last Saturday—a spot it earned by winning the MPSF’s automatic bid. The Cardinal defeated UMass and is now headed to Virginia to take on the No. 5 seed Dukes.
Tennis
Both the men’s and women’s tennis teams will be hosting first and second round NCAA matches at the Taube Tennis Center. Both teams are seeded eighth in their respective tournaments and should have no trouble advancing this weekend (each team has been stellar at home). The big roadblocks come later, as the No. 1 overall seed in both brackets looms if the Cardinal can advance. For the men that is Virginia, and for the women it is Baylor.
Danny Belch actually wrote a column that makes sense this time. Congratulate him at dbelch1 “at ” stanford.edu.