The No. 4 Stanford men’s volleyball team kicks off the second half of its Mountain Pacific Sports Federation season this weekend, playing host to two top-10 opponents–No. 8 UCLA on Friday night and No. 3 UC-Santa Barbara on Saturday night.

The past few weeks have been an up-and-down ride for the Cardinal (10-4, 7-4 MPSF). The team opened the regular season with a big home sweep of then-No. 2 BYU, but then split a road series in Hawaii.

The Cardinal went on a three-game win streak by defeating Pacific at home and then sweeping Loyola and Lewis College in a non-conference road trip to Chicago. However, Stanford couldn’t keep up the momentum and was stunned in a home loss to UC-San Diego

“UCSD played well and truly beat us,” said Stanford head coach John Kosty. “Every match in the MPSF is important and demands your very best.”

Last weekend, Stanford was badly overmatched in a 3-0 loss at USC before rallying to victory in the second match of the weekend, snapping a 13-match losing streak on the road against Pepperdine.

In all, the Cardinal has played six weekend series and split five of them, a statistic that could be attributed to the parity in the MPSF–11 of the 12 teams in the conference are currently listed in the AVCA Division-I rankings.

But despite the difficulty that playing in the MPSF presents, Kosty still isn’t satisfied.

“We need to keep improving our consistency with every practice and game,” he said. “The MPSF is always good from top to bottom, and it’s a given that every weekend means we will face two quality opponents.”

UCLA (8-8) comes into Friday’s match with a 3-7 MPSF conference record, but they have a lot to play for. The Bruins are within reach of the 8th conference spot–the last entry into the season-ending tournament and a potential NCAA berth. Led by outside hitter Weston Dunlap, the Bruins split a series with Hawaii and are a very dangerous serving team, ranking second in the MPSF with 1.31 aces per set.

Stanford trails UCLA in the all-time series by a wide margin (61-15), but has had recent success with three-straight home victories.

On Saturday, Stanford welcomes in red-hot UC-Santa Barbara (9-6, 7-5) and will have its hands full against middle blocker Dylan Davis and outside hitter Scott Slaughter, who leads the MPSF in hitting percentage at .490. The Gauchos’ solid play has led them to their highest ranking since Feb. 19, 2007.

UCSB also leads the all-time series against the Cardinal 42-27, with a few of those losses coming at the hands of Kosty, who was a standout player with the Gauchos in the 1980s. However, Stanford won the last meeting between the two teams last April, 3-0.

Junior setter Evan Barry is fourth in the MPSF with 10.96 assists per set, and two-time All-American junior libero Erik Shoji is second in the conference and sixth in the country with 2.52 digs per set.

The match against UCLA tips at 7 p.m. Friday at Maples Pavilion.