NCAA Women’s Volleyball : Pacific, Stanford in Final After Ousting UCLA, USC

UCLA and USC each came 2,000 miles to this snow-covered pocket of volleyball fever to play for the NCAA women’s championship on Sunday. They’ll still play on Sunday, but it won’t be for the championship.

Both teams were derailed in their respective semifinals and will play a largely anticlimactic consolation match before the championship final between Stanford and Pacific. Pacific defeated UCLA, 15-11, 15-7, 9-15, 17-15. Stanford cruised passed USC, 15-9, 7-15, 15-10, 15-6.

Despite being seeded third, defending champion UCLA was considered by many observers to be the favorite, but No. 2-ranked Pacific came out roaring and took the first two games. UCLA, plagued by erratic passing and offensive breakdowns, regrouped in the third game. After a timeout with the score tied at 5-5, UCLA spurted to a 10-5 lead and held off a late Pacific rally.

Both teams had a chance to win the crucial forth game. UOP led 14-10, but UCLA staged one of it’s patented last-mintue charges and went ahead, 15-14, on a spectacular kill from the back row by All-American Liz Masakayan. But UOP rallied back into the lead and won a trip to the finals when All-American Julie Maginot ripped a vicious cross-court spike that Masakayan couldn’t retrieve.

Pacific was paced by freshman sensation Elaina Oden, the PCAA player of the year, who had 20 kills and led everyone with a .375 hitting percentage. Sophomore Terri McGrath was Pacific’s other major weapon, adding 10 kills and combining with Oden on 9 of the team’s 20 blocks.

Masakayan almost single-handedly kept UCLA in the match, racking up 28 kills in 56 attempts. But Dawn Kenny, normally a clutch star in key matches, had the worst night of her career, hitting only .053. Outside hitter Leslie Brewer was almost as bad at .087, and UCLA’s other players just couldn’t manufacture enough offense to compensate.

The contrast between the first and second matches couldn’t have been greater. The UCLA-Pacific match was charged with electricity and fueled by numerous superb rallies.

But USC’s loss to Stanford was a yawner that almost lulled the crowd of 6,941 to sleep. USC was uncharacteristically flat, and Stanford played just well enough to win.

After taking turns looking bad in the first two games, the teams finally generated some excitement in the third game, which Stanford took, 15-10.

USC lost its only real chance to take control of the match late in game three when Tracy Clark served out after USC had closed to within three at 10-13.