On Saturday, #8 Stanford women’s volleyball defeated Arizona on The Farm 3-0 (25-17, 25-19, 25-23). Kendall Kipp led the way for the Cardinal with 17 kills, 7 digs, and 3 blocks while Elia Rubin had 13 kills. Stanford improves to 22-4 overall and 17-1 in the Pac-12 while Arizona falls to 15-14 overall and 5-13 in the Pac-12.
The first set was tight early on as they were tied 6-6 after a kill by Kipp and an attack error committed by Rubin. It would be back and forth for a bit as both teams were tied 9-9 later after exchanging kills.
From there, Stanford would slowly grow their lead and not look back. After having a 16-14 lead, Stanford won three points in a row off kills from Kami Miner and Annabelle Smith, making it a 19-14 lead. From there, Stanford won the set 25-17.
Stanford got off to a strong start in the second set, leading 4-1 after back-to-back kills from McKenna Vicini. After Arizona made it 6-3, Stanford went on a 4-0 run to lead 10-3 as Elena Oglivie got a service ace during the run. From there, it was pretty smooth sailing for Stanford as they led 20-12 after a kill by Rubin before winning the set 25-19 after Vicini got the set clinching kill.
The third set was tight all the way through. Stanford did have a 14-9 lead at one point, but Arizona found a way to win 7 of the next 10 points to make it 16-16. From there, it was back and forth all the way through as both teams were tied 22-22. What swung things in the direction of the Cardinal was back-to-back kills from Kipp to give them a 24-22 lead. After Miner committed a service error, Kipp once again, off an assist from Miner, got the match-clinching kill to make it a 25-23 third set victory and straight set victory.
For Stanford, this was just another day at the office, but to their credit, they really handled their business well. There wasn’t much drama in this one and they did a nice job of responding to the changes that Arizona made coming into the match.
“They’re playing a lot better, they got long arms,” Stanford head coach Kevin Hambly said of Arizona. “They just beat Washington at their place. So, I think they’re playing really well. We’ll see, I think we’re gonna have to play better than we did tonight to beat those guys.”
“We’re trying to keep a national championship mentality,” Rubin added. “We know that we can, if we focus on playing our best volleyball, we’re gonna be locked in. So that’s just kind of our goal right now is staying with the championship mentality and taking each one game at a time. Focusing on our side of the net and finishing off Pac-12 to the tournament. We’re looking forward to it.”
Up next for Stanford is a home match against Oregon State on Wednesday. That will begin at 4:00 PM PT on Pac-12 Insider.
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