Michigan State University
19-14
Stanford
31-1
Spartans Fall to No. 1 Stanford in NCAA Tournament
12/7/2014 12:00:00 AM | Volleyball
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Palo Alto, Calif. -- Michigan State's season came to an end on Saturday at the hands of top-ranked Stanford, as MSU fought through four tough sets but fell to the Cardinal, 3-1 (20-25, 25-22, 26-24, 23-25). MSU concludes its season at 19-14, while top-seeded Stanford advances to the Round of 16 with a 31-1 overall record.
The final statistics tell the tale of a tough battle for both teams, as Stanford jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the match, committing just five hitting errors as compared to 18 for the Spartans; however, MSU flipped the script and won set three 26-24, and had arguably its best set in the fourth, hitting .350 as a team with just one error on 40 swings. MSU had one more kill on the night than the Cardinal (60-59), as the teams were even in assists (57), digs (61), and points (73). The home team had a 10-6 edge in blocks.
For the Spartans, sophomores Chloe Reinig and Allyssah Fitterer each had 15 kills, as Reinig added five blocks and Fitterer hit .343. Freshman Alyssa Garvelink established a new career high with 13 kills, hitting a team-best .346 with three blocks and a pair of digs.
The seniors also played a huge part in tonight's battle - senior libero Kori Moster finished her night with 13 digs, moving her into sole possession of third place among all-time Big Ten career dig leaders (2,218). Ryian Hubbard had 12 digs while Taylor Galloway had 13 digs and 11 kills for a double-double in her final career math. Jazmine White had five kills and a pair of blocks, hitting .286, in her collegiate swan song. Galloway and Moster each had a pair of service aces as well.
Freshman setter Rachel Minarick finished with 52 assists, which was three shy of her career best; she also added eight digs on the night.
Stanford had four players with double-digit kills, paced by a double-doubles from Jordan Burgess (15 kills, 18 digs) and Brittany Howard (12 kills, 10 digs). Inky Ajanaku contributed 13 kills and four blocks, while freshman Merete Lutz tied for the match lead with five blocks and added 10 kills.
"Its never easy when a season ends, but Im very proud of the way we competed tonight," said head coach Cathy George, who wraps her 10th season on the Spartan sideline with a fourth consecutive trip to the NCAA tournament and a seventh trip overall. "I thought we really could have folded after going down 2-0, but we just battled to get back in there. I thought that with a break or two, we probably could have forced a game five, but credit to Stanford.
"I thought that a difficult schedule in our non-conference season as well as the day-in, day-out battles we have in the Big Ten prepared us for the fight we got tonight," continued George. "I don't know that we could have put up a game like this early in the season, but as we have grown and matured as a young team, we have learned how to do it. The most difficult part is that there's no practice tomorrow, no `next game' to apply what we've learned tonight. But I am extremely proud that we went down fighting the way we did. Our players left it all on the floor, and that's all we could ask."
The early part of the match featured big swings on both sides, with MSU standing toe-to-toe with the top-ranked Cardinal; Stanford pushed out to a five point lead at 11-6, but MSU kept fighting back into it, and had trouble gaining more than a three-point separation from its guests, who trailed 15-13 at the first media timeout. Out of the break, MSU put together a 3-0 run, featuring two White kills and an ace from freshman DS Marissa Ratzenberger, to knot the score at 15. After Stanford got the sideout, MSU won a crazy rally that ended with a Fitterer termination to tie it at 16, but Stanford rallied for three straight points on a kill by Lutz, followed by back-to-back Spartan errors. MSU fought back into it at 22-20 on a kill from Reinig (her sixth of the set), but was blocked by Ajanaku on her next attempt to make it 23-20. A kill by Morgan Boukather followed by a shot that sailed long for Garvelink gave the home team a 25-20 win in the opening set.
Lutz, the Cardinal's 6-8 freshman middle, opened the second set with consecutive blocks, giving the home team an early lead that they built out to 4-1 on a pair of MSU miscues. Three points was the largest lead it could muster in the early part of the match, despite coming alive for four blocks in the first nine points. Trailing 10-7, Fitterer came back with a shot that kissed the line, then recorded a cross-court shot after an MSU error to make it 11-9. Moster stepped to the line to serve, and after a Boukather error, she served back-to-back aces to pull the Spartans into the lead, their first of the night. A ball handling error, and ensuing MSU 14-12 advantage, forced Stanford into a timeout. The Cardinal scored consecutive points to get it back to a tie ballgame at 14, then alternated points to get to 16-16; Lutz then posted a block and a kill before MSU got the sideout on a Fitterer kill, but Lutz came back with another kill; after a Spartan error, the home team had regained its three-point lead (20-17), forcing MSU into a timeout. The teams alternated points, with the Cardinal holding a four-point edge on another Lutz termination before Reinig and Garvelink put up back-to- back kills, pulling MSU within two at 23-21 and forcing the home team to use its final timeout. The Cardinal got a kill by Howard to get to set point, but Reinig put up a big block to pull back within a pair; Ajanaku finished it off with a sharp-angle shot to take set two 25-22.
The opening of the third set was all MSU, as Reinig and Fitterer came out with a block each, and Reinig had two kills to Fitterer's one to give MSU a 5-1 advantage. With a 7-2 MSU edge, the home team got consecutive points with a Ajanaku kill and MSU error, buta sharp-angle shot by reinig down the line, followed by a cross-court kill by Garvelink pushed it back to a five-point edge, 9-4. Garvelink came up with two more kills sandwiched around a double block with White, to give MSU a 12-5 edge and force the home team to use its final timeout of the set. After a Galloway kill gave MSU a 15-8 lead, the Cardinal put together a 4-0 run on a block by Boukather and Lutz, a Howard kill, a Spartan error, and an Ajanaku stuff at the net, and then another 4-1 run made it 17-17. An Ajanaku kill, followed by a Burgess block on Garvelink, gave Stanford its first lead of the set at 19-18. The Spartans battled it out, pulling back into the lead at 20-19, and then alternated points until scoring back-to-back points by Galloway on a kill and an ace, giving MSU a 23-21 advantage. MSU got to set point on a kill by Fitterer (24-22), but the Cardinal fought off set point twice with a Howard kill and MSU error, which knotted the score at 24-24. Reinig got the kill to get back to set point, and Minarick served up an ace to take the third set 26-24 and pull within a set, 2-1.
Boukather was the hot hand for the Cardinal early in the fourth, recording a pair of kills and two aces to help her team to an 8-4 lead. MSU continued to show fight, cutting it down to a one-point deficit at 16-15 after trailing 11-7. A pair of tips over the net by Ajanaku and a heads-up tip into the back left corner by setter Madi Bugg gave Stanford back a three-point edge, 18-15. Out of a timeout, Fitterer got the sideout with her shot from the right pin, starting a 3-1 run that pulled MSU within a point, as Galloway recorded a kill and an ace. MSU battled to tie the match at 22, getting a kill from Garvelink (her career-best 13th of the night), followed by a Howard error for Stanford. Howard redeemed herself immediately to regain the lead, but the senior Galloway countered with a kill on a block out of bounds to knot the match at 23-23, but the Cardinal closed it out with back-to-back kills by Burgess to survive and advance to the round of 16.
The loss closes the careers of the four Spartan seniors - Kori Moster, Ryian Hubbard, Taylor Galloway, and Jazmine White - who helped MSU capture an NCAA Tournament win in each of their four seasons on the roster. In addition, the MSU tenure of retiring Associate Head Coach Russ Carney also came to a conclusion after 10 seasons.
