This weekend, #14 Stanford women’s volleyball will open up their regular season on the road in Nashville, Tennessee. On Friday they’ll play at Lipscomb before playing at Tennessee State on Saturday. Both games will air on ESPN+ at 4:00 PM PT.
On Lipscomb: Lipscomb is coming off a season in which they went 14-13 overall and 11-5 in the ASUN while also returning a good chunk of their team from last season. Junior middle blocker Meg Mersman (262 kills & 20 blocks), sophomore right side Addi Pelham (203 kills), 5th year outside hitter/right side Logan Gish (186 kills & 200 digs), and junior libero Delaney Smith (362 digs) are all back. Smith is the only returning player who played in all 101 sets for the Bisons.
Lipscomb is hoping to build on the winning record they had last season and make more noise this season. Obviously, the chance to open up against a ranked program like Stanford has them very excited. While this is Lipscomb’s first regular season match, they did face Ole Miss in an exhibition, which they lost 3-2. Ole Miss isn’t a ranked program, but they’re still a solid high major program, coming off a 21-9 overall season and a 10-8 record in the SEC. Lipscomb has shown that they can compete with high major programs, so that in and of itself should have Stanford taking them seriously.
On Tennessee State: Tennessee State is coming off a season in which they went 10-17 overall and 2-16 in the Ohio Valley Conference. Even more depressing is of all the five players who had at least 100 kills last season, only one of them is back this season: Senior middle blocker/outside hitter Aleksandra Rojecka. On the bright side, maybe it’s good for them to get some new blood in, but even so, they do not project to be any better than they were last season due to all the talent that they lost.
Keys to the matches: For Stanford, if they are to get the road sweep in Nashville, the first thing they’re going to have to do is come out of the gates strong at Lipscomb. The Bisons are a decent team and they’re going to be fired up for this match. They’re going to have a pre-match block party outside of their arena and are going to do everything they can to get off to a strong start and take that first set. If Stanford can weather that first set and take the air out of the Bisons’ sails, they should be in a good spot to win the match.
The second thing Stanford needs to do is play clean. It can be easy for teams in the opening match to get antsy, rush things, and make some unforced errors. Stanford has more firepower than both of these teams, but if they try too hard, force things, and don’t capitalize on opportunities for kills, this weekend could get interesting.
Finally, Stanford needs to get Kendall Kipp and Caitie Baird in a rhythm early. Kipp (397) and Baird (479) led the team in kills last season and really benefited from all the assists that Kami Miner was giving them. If they get rolling, others should feed off that and that should propel Stanford to a weekend sweep. This could easily be a key for every match, but in your season openers, it’s really huge if your stars get rolling as it can sometimes take role players longer to warm up.
Prediction: Stanford is coming in as the ranked team, so on those grounds alone they should win both matches. The trickiest part of this two-match swing is that they’re getting Lipscomb first, who is the better team. That creates more possibility for an upset than if they were to open with Tennessee State.
That said, Stanford did take care of business last season in their opening slate in Philadelphia when they defeated Villanova and Temple 3-0 in both matches. Since Stanford has done this just one season ago, I’m going to say Stanford wins both matches 3-0. The first set against Lipscomb might get a little tight, but I think Stanford will find a way to get the shut out.
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