Stanford tops WSU in big Pac-12 battle; Oregon, Louisville, Pitt, GT, Arkansas, Rice win

Third-ranked Stanford won an intense battle at No. 4 Washington State to take over sole possession of first place in the Pac-12, which now has four teams a game back tied for second.

Georgia Tech escaped at Virginia in an exciting day in the ACC, the SEC’s Arkansas rolled on, and Rice continued its strong American Athletic Conference start. 

The recaps and top performances follow.

There are eight matches on Monday’s NCAA Division I women’s volleyball schedule, six in the SWAC (click here for the SWAC schedule) plus Indiana at Evansville in the Missouri Valley and Seattle U at Utah Valley in the WAC.

There are seven matches Tuesday, including North Carolina at Wake Forest in the ACC and Utah State at Boise State — tied for the league lead at 5-1 — in the Mountain West.

Wednesday’s 15 matches show Purdue at Indiana and Minnesota at Michigan in the Big Ten, Virginia Tech at Wake Forest in the ACC and three Big 12 matches with TCU at Oklahoma, West Virginia at UCF and Iowa State at Kansas State.

Look for the new VolleyballMag.com Super 16 Media Poll that posts here at 11 a.m. Eastern.

PAC-12: Don’t let the fourth-set score fool you. Stanford’s 31-29, 29-27, 23-25, 25-18 victory at Washington State was every bit worthy of a late-rounds NCAA Tournament match as the Cardinal improved to 13-2 and stayed alone atop the standings at 6-0. Washington State dropped to a game back at 15-2, 5-1, tied with Arizona State, Oregon and USC in second place.

Stanford, which had huge advantages in aces (10-1) and blocks (68-50), won its 24th Pac-12 match in a row and is 9-0 on the road this season. And the Cardinal were playing without 6-5 senior middle Sami Francis, still out with an injury. In her place, 6-foot-1 senior Malia Tufuga had no kills but seven blocks, two solo, as she played in her fourth match season after playing three sets in 2022. 

Elia Rubin led Stanford with 21 kills — seven in the first set — an assist, an ace, three blocks and 10 digs. Kendally Kipp had 20 kills, an ace, two blocks and seven digs. Caitie Baird had 18 kills but only one error in 35 attacks to hit .486 and had an assist, an ace, seven digs and three blocks, one solo. McKenna Vicini had nine kills with no errors in 17 swings and six…