Feb. 22, 2002
Stanford, Calif. - The Stanford men's volleyball team tried to upset the top-ranked team for the second consecutive match after defeating previous No. 1 UCLA last week, but came up short in a 3-2 (25-30, 30-24, 34-32, 23-30, 15-13) battle with Pepperdine on Friday night in Maples Pavilion.
With the loss, the Cardinal fall to 8-7 on the year and 7-5 in the MPSF. The Waves improve to 13-4 and 8-2 in conference play.
Stanford took the first game from the Waves, 30-25, behind the hitting of Paul Bocage (Princeton, NJ) and Curt Toppel (Pacific Palisades, CA). Bocage hit for a .714 clip and five kills, while Toppel added four. The Cardinal hit .387 to Pepperdine's .179.
The Wave came back to take game two 30-24, getting four kills each from Lance Walker and Sean Rooney, setting up game three. Stanford jumped out to a 6-1 lead in game three behind the serving of Marcus Skacel (Laguna Niguel, CA). Pepperdine then came back to get within two, before the score was tied at 26-26. Following a Toppel kill the Cardinal served for their first match point holding a 29-28 lead, but recorded a service error. Stanford had three more game point opportunities, but could not take advantage. The Cardinal had a chance up 31-30, but another serving error allowed Pepperdine back into the match. The Waves then served up an ace and Stanford hit a ball wide giving Pepperdine the third game 34-32.
Down 2-1, Stanford came back and dominated the fourth game 30-23. Toppel recorded 11 kills for the Cardinal to force a fifth game. Pepperdine prevailed and held a lead on the Cardinal the entire game. The Cardinal did tie the game at 10-10, but hitting errors allowed the Waves back into the game. A Bocage kill got Stanford within 14-13, but Pepperdine's Chirs Van Reusen pounded a kill to give the Wave the game five victory 15-13.
Toppel led the Cardinal with a match-high 31 kills, followed by Bocage with a season-high 20 kills and Skacel's 14. Stanford was also tough defensively with four Cardinal recording double-digit digs. Seth Ring (Bend, OR) registered a match-high 14 with Kevin Hansen (Newport Beach, CA) adding 12 and Skacel 10. Hansen also dished out a career-high 76 assists.
Lance Walker led five Waves in double-digit kill figures with 19. Fred Winters and Sean Rooney each added 15 to the Pepperdine attack.
The Cardinal will conclude their four-match homestand on Sunday against the USC Trojans. First serve is set for 1 p.m. in Maples Pavilion.
1 2 3 4 5 No. 1 Pepperdine (13-4, 8-2) 25 30 34 23 15 No. 7 Stanford (8-7, 7-5) 30 24 32 30 13