Feb. 16, 2007
Tonight in Maples Pavilion, Stanford struggled to keep pace with the balanced attack of the Anteaters. While both teams were plagued by service errors, Stanford hit just .151 on the match while Irvine hit .378, which gave the Anteaters the winning edge. Stanford was led by junior Matt Ceran and freshman Evan Romero, who had 9 kills and 5 blocks each. Sophomore Brandon Williams added 8 kills for the Cardinal. Seniors Jayson Jablonsky and Matt Webber led Irvine with 21 kills between them. The loss drops Stanford to 1-8, 1-13 overall while UC Irvine improves to 8-3, 13-3 overall.
Stanford took an early 4-1 lead on game one, which they were able to hold on to until UC Irvine rallied back to even the score at 8 all. Irvine then took a 10-12 lead to force a Stanford timeout. After several Irvine points, Stanford was able to close the gap with a kill by Brandon Williams, 18-21. With a service ace and kill, Irvine took a 18-23 lead. They were able to maintain a three to four point lead until Williams closed the gap once again on an Irvine match point, 27-29. Irvine took game one 27-30.
In game two Stanford started off with a 3-1 lead. The two teams matched each other point-for-point, however Stanford was able to take a two point lead at 16-14 to force an Irvine timeout. Out of the timeout, the Anteaters scored four straight points, started off with kill by Jayson Jablonsky, putting the Anteaters on top 16-18. Irvine, which hit .464 on the game, maintained control of the game two and went on to win it 22-30.
The momentum continued to swing in Irvine's favor in game three. They jumped out to a 6-12 lead over the Cardinal and never looked back. Irvine's balanced attack proved too much for Stanford to handle, as they took game three 20-30.
Stanford will continue their brief home stand tomorrow evening against No. 6 UCLA. Catch the Cardinal in Burnham Pavilion starting at 7:00 PM.
#3 UC Irvine d. Stanford University (30-27, 30-22, 30-20)