March 21, 2009
STANFORD, Calif. - The No. 6 Stanford men's volleyball team had its six-match winning streak snapped by Cal Baptist, 30-27, 30-26, 30-28, in a nonconference match at Burnham Pavilion on Saturday night.
The Cardinal got 10 kills from Spencer McLachlin and 32 assists from Kawika Shoji, but was unable to beat the NAIA's top-ranked team. Cal Baptist (22-5) got 23 kills from Adiel Tiedjop in earning its fourth victory over a Mountain Pacific Sports Federation opponent.
"When I scheduled Cal Baptist, I knew they were one of the top teams in the country," Stanford coach John Kosty said. "This was a great match for us coming out of Dead Week and finals."
The match was the first in two weeks for Stanford (14-8), which led 26-21 in the first set and battled point-for-point in both the second and third sets before falling.
"It brought back all the things we need to work on," Kosty said. "And it was a perfect opponent to get us away from thinking about academics and to refocus on volleyball. It was a good first game back for us."
Stanford returns to action with a weekend series at home against No. 2 Cal State Northridge (Friday) and No. 12 UC Santa Barbara (Saturday) at Maples Pavilion.