Grand Canyon Falls To No. 4 Stanford

Saturday, January 11

Stanford, CA

8 p.m.

Grand Canyon

1-1

Stanford

3-0

Grand Canyon

Stanford

Ben Ponnet had seven kills and eight digs at No. 4 Stanford Saturday.

Photo by: Darryl Webb

1/11/2014 10:10:00 PM | Men's Volleyball

Box Score

Antelopes Take on Two National Champs Next Week

Grand Canyon was unable to pull off historic comebacks on back-to-back nights.

One night after rallying for the program's first-ever two-set deficit comeback in a 3-2 win over Pacific, Grand Canyon (1-1) lost 3-0 to No. 4 Stanford (3-0) by set scores of 25-20, 25-17, 25-18 at Burnham Pavilion in Stanford, Calif., Saturday.

"We need to get better at the service line," said GCU coach Jeremy Price, whose club had 15 service errors and one ace Saturday. "We didn't do a bad job siding-out, but we have to do a better job taking care of transition opportunities. We'll focus on that this week at practice."

The Antelopes had three short leads early in the second set. Stanford opened the second with a service error. Sophomore middle hitter Christian Ward had a kill for a 2-1 lead and another Cardinal service error gave the Antelopes a 3-2 advantage.

For the second straight night, senior All-MIVA outside hitter Ben Ponnet led GCU in kills. He had seven Saturday and a team-high eight digs. Off the bench, in two sets, Erik Jansen had six kills on 14 swings and a .286 attack percentage. Ward had five kills on eight tries and a .625 average.

"Eric Jansen did a nice job coming off the bench and creating offense," added Price. "Christian Ward did a good job for us offensively, as well."

GCU out-blocked Stanford 5.5 -3. Keaton Berry had a match-best three block assists.

The Antelopes play three matches next weekend in Irvine, Calif., opening Friday at 8 p.m. (Arizona Time) against NAIA national champion Concordia-Irvine. On Jan. 18, GCU takes on NCAA Division III champion Springfield at 4 p.m. and Concordia-Irvine at 8 p.m.

STAN 3, GCU 0