Recap: No. 5 Stanford Women’s Volleyball falls to No. 10 SMU
On Sunday, No. 5 Stanford women’s volleyball fell to No. 10 SMU at home in four sets: 22-25, 25-21, 23-25, 12-25. SMU outside hitter Malaya Jones led the way for the Mustangs with 24 kills and nine digs while outside hitter Kennedi Rogers had 13 kills and six blocks. Stanford middle blocker Lizzy Andrew and outside hitter Elia Rubin each had 11 kills for the Cardinal. SMU improves to 21-5 overall and 13-3 in the ACC while Stanford falls to 23-4 overall and 14-2 in the ACC.
BOX SCORE: SMU at Stanford-Sunday, November 16th
“Yeah, I mean, I think we created lots of opportunities for ourselves against this team, especially in the first three sets and we just didn’t execute the way we needed to,” Stanford head coach Kevin Hambly said after the match. “And when you’re not executing against a team that’s top 10 team, you’re gonna get in some trouble and that’s what kinda happened.”
The first set was tight early as it was tied up 6-6. After Madison Scheer and Lizzy Andrew traded kills, it was tied up 10-10. SMU then went on a 4-0 run to lead 14-10 as Christa Wilburn had a service ace to close out the run. After back-to-back kills from Jones, it was an 18-13 lead for the Mustangs. From there, SMU would take the set 25-22 as Stanford was unable to come back from 24-20 down. Jones was up to seven kills for the Mustangs while Erika Sayer’s four kills led the Cardinal.
In the second set, Stanford would respond. They led 4-1 after kills from Rubin and Logan Parks. SMU would fight their way back to make it 7-7 before a kill from Jordyn Harvey and an attack error by SMU made it a 9-7 lead for Stanford. After a 3-0 run that included a kill by Rubin and back-to-back service aces from Harvey, Stanford led 14-9. After a kill by Julia Blyashov, Stanford led 17-13. SMU then went on a 4-0 run to make it 17-17.
To Stanford’s credit, they did not give up the lead. SMU would tie it again 18-18, but back-to-back kills from Sayer and Andrew made it 20-18 and back-to-back kills from Andrew made it 22-19. From there, Stanford would take the set 25-21 as they won three of the final four points of the set. It was now tied 1-1 as Andrew had seven kills while hitting .700.
The third set was pivotal and both teams knew that. Stanford jumped out to an early 3-1 lead as Harvey had a kill and service ace while Andrew had a kill. After a service ace from Casey Batenhorst, SMU tied it up 5-5. After a kill by Sayer, Stanford led 14-13. SMU then went on a 4-0 run to lead 17-14 as Rogers had a kill while Stanford had three errors that included a bad set. After getting down 24-21, Stanford attempted to rally back, winning back-to-back points to make it 24-23, but a kill by Rogers clinched the set 25-23. 2-1 lead for the Mustangs.
In the fourth set, Stanford simply ran out of steam as SMU dominated them 25-12. The Mustangs jumped out to a 4-0 lead and later a 9-3 lead and never looked back. A kill by Jones made it 24-11 to give the Mustangs set point and then after a kill from Harvey made it 24-12, Jones got the match clinching kill to make it 25-12. 3-1 SMU won.
“Yeah, scoring, they hit very well,” Hambly said of what the Mustangs did to win. “They attacked at a real high level and they hit .467, .520 in the last two sets. And that was a lot about our execution. We hit them off the net. They weren’t passing great. We were able to take their middles kind of out of the game and we still weren’t able to stop them and that’s what I talk about execution is a lot on the defensive side.”
As a result of the weekend, SMU having swept Cal and Stanford rises to No. 8 in the nation, Stanford stays at No. 5, and Pittsburgh falls to No. 4 after being No. 3. Had Stanford defeated SMU, they would likely be ranked No. 4 and in the driver’s seat to be one of the four number one seeds in the NCAA tournament. Instead, they need to win out against Cal (twice), at home against Georgia Tech, and at No. 7 Louisville to end the season. Of course, they may have needed to win all those matches including SMU anyways, but still. This loss to SMU just adds even more pressure on the Cardinal.
“I don’t know, I mean it’s tough,” Hambly said when asked if there was maybe a bit of a hangover from the emotional win over Pitt. “I mean, some of it was, you know, we had to change setters in the middle of the match, too. You know? So it’s hard to say. But everything’s a factor this time of year, you know? Like trying to turn around and feeling good about yourself, feeling good, and then trying to turn around and play another great match. But, you know, it’s no excuse. This is an opportunity for us to play against two really good teams that are Sweet Sixteen, Elite Eight type teams and we need to learn how to win those matches if we want to go to the Final Four. And we didn’t execute.”
At this point, all that Stanford can do is shake this one off and get ready for Cal on Wednesday night. That will be the first of two matches against the Golden Bears this week with the second game being on Sunday. The Wednesday match will be on The Farm at 7:00 PM PT and the Sunday match will be in Berkeley at 1:00 PM PT. Both matches will air on ACCNX.
“It’s a weird match, it’s a weird week because we’re playing two,” Hambly said. “You know, two matches in a row. So we had to figure out how to win six sets against them and they just took a set off Pitt. So, I’ve watched them a few times, but I haven’t watched them a ton. So I don’t have a lot of thoughts as far as like, what they’re like, but we’ll see if we can get back to work and see if we can execute at a high level.”
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