The No. 4 Stanford men’s volleyball team headed to the Midwest over the weekend to take on a pair of powers: No. 8 Penn State in a rematch of the 2010 national championship match and No. 10 Ohio State in a matchup of the past two national champions. The Cardinal came away with a split in the third and fourth matches of its 10-match road stretch, falling to Penn State (3-1) in four sets (26-24, 16-25, 25-17, 25-17) before defeating Ohio State (6-4) in five sets (25-22, 23-25, 24-26, 25-22, 15-12).

For the Cardinal (5-2), the Penn State match was a tale of two halves. During the first two sets, the Cardinal went toe-to-toe with the Nittany Lions, even dominating Penn State at times. The second two were a different story, despite strong nights from senior outside hitter Brad Lawson (12 kills), sophomore outside hitter Steven Irvin (10 kills) and senior middle blocker Gus Ellis (seven kills on seven attempts).

Stanford came out ready to prove to Penn State that the rematch would be no different than the last meeting between these two teams, jumping out to a 10-5 lead in the first set. However, the Nittany Lions countered with a 7-2 run of their own to even the score at 12.The rest of the set was a back-and-forth affair, with the Cardinal even gaining a set point at 24-23. However, Penn State senior outside hitter Joe Sunder came up huge with consecutive kills, and the Nittany Lions closed out the Cardinal on a block by middle blocker Nick Turko and opposite Tom Comfort.

The second set went decidedly in Stanford’s favor. The Cardinal again raced out to a 10-5 lead, mostly thanks to some sloppy serving by Penn State. This time, the Cardinal did not give the lead get away, never letting Penn State get any closer than four points.

Due to some good adjustments by Penn State, the Cardinal was not able to maintain the same level of play during the last two sets, falling behind early in the third and giving up a 15-7 run to end it in the fourth.

“This year’s match against Penn State certainly conjured up memories of our championship match. We had equally high expectations, but unfortunately didn’t play up to our potential,” Lawson said. “I thought our communication and determination in general were lacking on Friday night, but it was encouraging to see us turn it around against Ohio State on Saturday.”

Turn it around they did. While the story on Friday night may have been a lack of energy, there was certainly no shortage of that on Saturday, thanks in large part to setter Dylan Kordic. The senior, who had played just five career matches before Saturday night’s contest, came up with a clutch 23-assist performance after relieving an injured Evan Barry in the third set, rallying the Cardinal to fourth- and fifth-set victories.

As good as he was, he certainly did not do it alone. Lawson, Irvin and sophomore outside hitter Brian Cook each shared the team lead in kills with 17, sophomore middle blocker Eric Mochalski turned in a typically efficient performance with 11 kills on 17 attempts for a .529 hitting percentage and senior libero Erik Shoji led the defensive effort with a season-high 16 digs.

Stanford was able to win the first set, never trailing after evening the score at two points apiece. Both squads hurt themselves with six service errors each during the set, though Stanford finally closed out the Buckeyes, 25-22, on an Ellis kill.

During the second set, the Buckeyes were able to keep the Cardinal at bay after using a 7-2 run to take a 13-9 lead, from which they never looked back. Stanford was able to battle back, erasing two set points to draw within one after consecutive kills from Irvin and Lawson, but was done in on the next point.

Kordic would enter center stage for Barry in the third with Stanford trailing 20-17, promptly rallying the Cardinal to a tie at 24 after a kill by Cook. Stanford was not able to finish the job at hand, however, as Ohio State closed out the set on consecutive kills by senior opposite Shawn Sangrey.

The Cardinal, thanks to Kordic and Irvin, would win the back-and-forth affair in the final two sets, using a 10-4 run to decisively close out the match.

Kordic thanked his teammates for his success during the match, a trend not uncommon among this close group. “We were successful because the guys stepped up big,” he said. “Semi-jokingly, I told them they really needed to help me out by passing perfectly and hitting bad sets. But that’s exactly what they did.”

The Cardinal is back on the road this weekend, taking on BYU on back-to-back nights.