Over the weekend, No. 5 Stanford women’s volleyball advanced to the Sweet Sixteen of the NCAA tournament with 3-0 sweeps over Sacramento State and LMU at home in the first and second rounds. Stanford is the No. 2 seed in the region and the No. 5 overall national seed in the tournament.
Stanford’s win over Sacramento State was 25-19, 25-17, and 25-19. Stanford outside hitter Elia Rubin was the top performer for the Cardinal with 15 kills and five digs while outside hitter Jordyn Harvey had 10 kills, four digs, and three blocks.
Stanford’s win over LMU was even more efficient as they won 25-17, 25-16, 25-17. Elia Rubin had a double-double for Stanford with 15 kills and 10 digs while Jordyn Harvey (13 kills) and outside hitter Ipar Kurt (10 kills) also were in double figures.
BOX SCORE: Sacramento State at Stanford-Friday, December 6th
BOX SCORE: LMU at Stanford-Saturday, December 7th
“Yeah, I mean, I thought we played a really efficient match,” Stanford head coach Kevin Hambly said after the LMU victory. “I think offensively. Well, I think LMU, first of all, congratulations to them, I think they have a great team. I love their team and I thought that they brought it and we brought our best and they got our best, which is like the ultimate respect when you play a team. I think, we were so efficient and we did a nice job passing and serving and put a ton of pressure on them and I thought Kami did a really nice job of distributing the ball and I mean, we hit .500 for the match. What did we hit for the match? Like, .535, that’s pretty outstanding.”
“It was big, we knew that LMU was gonna come out strong, we watched them last night, and they played with a lot of fire,” Elia Rubin added. “So we knew that we had to stay disciplined on our side of the net, stay calm, stay focused, and I think we did exactly that. Like, we always want to bring our best to every single game, stay consistent throughout the match, and I think this is one of the games for the first time in a while that we did that. So we’re really proud of that and we’re just happy to stay consistent. We wanna bring this into next week.”
Stanford was in control both matches as is evident by the final score though funny enough, the Sacramento State match was a bit tighter. When looking at the stats, the biggest difference was the hitting percentage. Stanford hit .392 against Sac State while hitting .535 against LMU. Stanford was a bit cleaner and sharper against the Lions and perhaps that was in part to them finding their groove for a second straight night while they were perhaps shaking off a bit of rust in the first match.
“Just really steady offensively,” Hambly said of their consistency. “I thought we played really hard on defense and they have some really talented players. I thought we did a nice job of getting them off the net and taking them out of system and then defending from that space.”
Stanford did serve better against Sac State though with 12 service aces and 11 service errors while having four service aces and nine service errors against LMU. So that was one thing that Stanford did do better in their first match. In the win over Sac State, Ipar Kurt had four service aces while Elia Rubin had three service aces, so the two of them really brought it with their serves.
The big star for both matches for Stanford was definitely Elia Rubin. She had 30 kills and only four errors in both matches combined. She’s really taken her game up a notch from last year and continues to get better.
“Decision making,” Hambly said of what the biggest thing is that he’s seen from Rubin. “Not trying to do too much. I think for her as far as like tactically and technically, it’s a lot of that. Just really good decision making, good choices. She worked really hard and she’s a really hard worker. She worked hard to be a better passer, better defensive player, better blocker, and she’s continuing to grow. It’s not like she just in the spring she finished it. She’s still working on it and we get a couple days here to train and see if we can get even better, you know? But I think for her a lot of that came down to decision making and not trying to do too much. Just staying within herself.”
“It’s so fun, it’s honestly like, I feel like there’s a lot of relief now because I know what to expect and like I was telling Kevin earlier, the tournament matches kind of feel like how the ACC felt for us this year,” Rubin added. “Like every weekend we have a new opponent, we gotta prepare for them, and they’re all gonna be really good teams giving us our best. So, I don’t know, something feels a little bit different about this year. It feels like we’re prepared and we kinda know how to handle new teams every weekend and so I think that’s exciting coming into it. Like, we can’t just get set. Like, playing the same teams. So it’s fun going into the tournament and playing new teams every week.”
Looking ahead to the rest of the tournament, something that Stanford is going to want to do is get their middle blockers going more. Especially Sami Francis. She got the match-clinching kill against LMU, finishing with 10 kills for the weekend. If Stanford can get her going a bit more, that would take some pressure off their outside hitters.
“I think we could get the middles going a little bit more still,” Hambly said of what he wants to see more from this team. “I think it would be nice to get a little bit more slides to Sami. She crushed that last one and then defensively out of system, we’re getting them out of system. I think we could be a little bit better defensively there. But I need to watch tape really to understand. We’re playing Florida, so it’ll be a lot more about trying to get ready for Florida than it will be about us.”
Up next for Stanford is their Sweet Sixteen match against Florida at Louisville on Thursday at 4:00 PM PT on ESPN2. The winner will face either top four overall seed Louisville or Purdue with a chance to go to the Final Four, which will also be played at Louisville.
“Martin, great opposite, one of the best opposites in the country and they’re tough and they win a lot of matches,” Hambly said of Florida. “That’s all I know. Give me a couple days. I’ll know a lot more.”
“Yeah, I mean we all know how the past two years have gone us hosting here in the reginal semifinals and finals,” Rubin said of having to go on the road this year. “So who knows? Maybe switching it up will be nice. Getting acclimated to Louisville would be great, too. So, it’s gonna be a little bit different. Obviously we won’t have our home crowd advantage, but I think we’re up for the battle, we’re excited, and it’s gonna be something new like I said, we like it and we’re excited for it.
“It [the NCAA tournament] is so fun. I mean, just the environment is so electric. It’s hard, obviously, every single game. It is a battle because you are fighting for your lives literally in the tournament. One loss and you’re out, so sending people home is hard, but it’s so much fun I mean, we love it. It’s absolutely electric and I know Louisville is gonna bring such a great crowd and we’re really excited for it.”
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