March 26, 2010
LA JOLLA, Calif. - Long after his team's three-set victory over UC San Diego on Friday night, Stanford men's volleyball coach John Kosty sat down in a 24-hour diner and enjoyed a strawberry milkshake.
"These always taste a lot better when you win," Kosty said.
This one must have tasted awfully good because No. 1 Stanford maintained its share of the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation lead with a near-flawless 30-18, 30-12, 30-20 performance.
The Cardinal hit a season-high .527 as a team to improve to 11-4 and stay in a first-place tie with Pepperdine, which earned a three-set victory over Hawai'i, at 11-4.
MPSF teams are not only fighting for the No. 1 seed in the conference tournament, which determined the MPSF's only automatic bid to the NCAA playoffs, but the regular-season champion would position itself well for the single NCAA at-large berth either way.
Stanford (14-4 overall) got 12 kills and only two errors apiece from Brad Lawson (.625) and Evan Romero (.526) in the victory. The Cardinal has a seven-match win streak and has won 11 of its past 12.
"Tonight, we wanted to be focused on our defense," said Kosty, whose team had 12 blocks and held UCSD (7-15, 3-12) to a .031 hitting percentage. "We already had confidence in our passing, and when we pass as well as we did, we roll."
Senior setter Kawika Shoji had 33 assists, six digs and three blocks for Stanford, and his brother, Erik, had 11 digs. Senior middle blocker Garrett Werner had a strong all-around match with five kills in six attacks (.833), and seven blocks. And Spencer McLachlin had no errors in 14 attacks, with nine kills (.643).
Stanford played its first MPSF match since March 6 because of a break for final exams and extended its streak of consecutive set victories to seven. The Cardinal plays at No. 9 Long Beach State (12-10, 8-7) on Saturday night.
"The nice thing is, we made plays, and we made smart plays," Kosty said. "We executed well tonight. We put together a good match."