Hollywood couldn’t have scripted it any better. With the two-week finals break looming, the men’s volleyball team picked a great time to sweep its first road weekend series in the MPSF. The No. 2 Cardinal rode what might have been its best defensive effort of the season to a four-set victory at UC-Irvine on Friday night before avenging a stunning loss to UC-San Diego earlier in the season with a 3-1 victory on Saturday night.

Stanford (14-4, 11-4 MPSF) now trails only No. 1 USC in the conference standings after slipping past BYU over the weekend, and has won five matches in a row–its longest win streak of the year.

The Cardinal had to deal with a hostile environment Saturday, as UC-San Diego hosted the largest crowd in school history–1,012. But none of it phased this year’s team, which has proven to be calm under pressure after several comebacks and tight victories. Senior outside hitter Spencer McLachlin had 21 kills in the 3-1 victory and junior Brad Lawson finished with 17 kills and 11 digs.

But it was junior setter Evan Barry who again led the offensive charge with a career night–Barry had 55 assists in four sets, tying the career high he set the previous night against UCI. As a team, the Card hit .369.

The Friday match with Irvine saw much of the same offensive prowess from the Stanford attack, but it was really the defense that got the job done. Junior libero Erik Shoji had 16 digs as part of a 51-dig effort from the team, which helped derail a balanced Anteater attack that still saw four players with double-figure kill totals.

Stanford has two weeks off before a match against Cal Baptist on March 19, and will dive back into MPSF play the next weekend, March 25-26, against Cal State-Northridge and Long Beach State. The Cardinal’s eyes might be focused on a date a little further down the road however, as a showdown with USC with the MPSF likely on the line will come at Maples Pavilion on Friday, April 1.