The time had finally come. The time that the Stanford women’s volleyball team had been preparing for all season: the NCAA tournament and the quest for a national title. No. 1 Stanford played against CSU Bakersfield, a team who parallels a completely different playing style from what the Cardinal had been used to during the Pac-12 season.
Adjusting to the unique tactics of the Runners created some bumps in the road for the Cardinal. However, Stanford demonstrated its ability to adapt to any circumstances thrown at them with a three-set win (25-21, 25-21, 25-18), moving on to the second round of the playoffs.
The first set saw Stanford blazing through the first half on runs of 6-1 with Stanford taking advantage of their significant height compared to those of CSU Bakersfield by putting up stiff blocks and deep-angled attacks. However, by the 14th point scored by the Cardinal, the Runners picked up on their plays and started to stay low and tight-knit on the ground, getting in more digs and decreasing the score difference to 14-13, the smallest difference of the entire set.
But, Stanford stopped CSU Bakersfield from ever gaining the lead, winning the set 25-21.
The second set paralleled the first set as the Cardinal started off with a massive lead ahead of the Runners at 11-4 until CSU Bakersfield using two timeouts to try and stop Stanford’s tremendous upward momentum. However, unlike the first set, the Runners did not minimize the lead differential to the same extent until the last three points of the set.
The third set proved to be the tightest set of the night. CSU Bakersfield started off with the lead at 2-0 until Stanford squared up, taking the lead at 7-4 forcing CSU Bakersfield to call a timeout. Post-timeout, an intense situation happened for Stanford with junior outside hitter Brittany Howard suffering a minor setback with her ankle due to a collision with an opposing player on Bakersfield, forcing her to sit out the rest of the match.
“Sometimes when you do that and you just land on someone else it just scares you and then there’s a little bit of pain too,” head coach John Dunning said of Howard’s situation.
With Howard out, Dunning substituted in redshirt freshman outside hitter Ivana Vanyak and freshman defense specialist Sarah Benjamin. The two players contributed their fair share to help Stanford keep and maintain its lead over CSU Bakersfield. Lutz scored the final kill for the Cardinal to secure its overall victory of the match.
Junior middle blockers Inky Ajanaku and Merete Lutz tied for the night with eight kills and Lutz led the team with a hitting percentage of .467.
“I’d say it’s just as exciting, but of course, you’re more involved and have to adjust on the court. Last year in the tournament, it was a lot of scaling the courts, trying to help the other middles on the team. But, this year, you’re the one that’s in it,” Lutz said.
In addition, senior opposite Morgan Boukather scored six kills and one service ace. Junior setter Madi Bugg recorded 31 assists and senior libero Kyle Gilbert made 16 digs for the team.
In round two of the playoffs, Stanford will play Michigan State at Maples Pavilion on Saturday night at 7 p.m. The match will be broadcasted on the Pac-12 networks.
Contact Divine Edem at [email protected].