Lopes move to MPSF Championship title match

Thursday, April 18

Los Angeles, Calif.

7 p.m.

Grand Canyon

24-4,10-2MPSF

Stanford

14-12,6-6MPSF

Stanford

Grand Canyon

Photo by: Nathan Peters

4/18/2024 11:07:00 PM | Men's Volleyball

Box Score

GCU, UCLA set for top-seeded showdown on Saturday evening in L.A.

By: Nathan Peters

LOS ANGELES – The second-seeded Grand Canyon men's volleyball team advanced to the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Championship title match by beating fourth-seeded Stanford 25-15, 24-26, 27-25, 25-17 in a Thursday night semifinal at Galen Center.

The match began in a back-and-forth fashion before the Lopes (24-4) won their fourth consecutive match to extend the program record for victories in a season. The MPSF Championship title match will take place Saturday at 6 p.m. at Galen Center in Los Angeles against the top-seeded UCLA (23-4).

"I am very proud of our complete effort tonight.," GCU head coach Matt Werle said. "I thought we did a lot of wonderful things that we didn't execute very well last night. Our service pressure and hitting our serving targets was almost flawless."

Camden Gianni, the GCU all-time service ace leader, broke his own single-season record early in the first set when he had back-to-back winners to give the Lopes some momentum and put his season number to 50 aces. From there, the Lopes closed the set on a monster 14-2 run.

GCU had 13 blocks on the match to Stanford's seven. Sophomore middle blocker Cameron Thorne led the match with a season-high nine.

"Once our blocking started getting going in that first set, we obviously just made them uncomfortable, made them kind of take their foot off the gas," Werle said. "We just kind of found some confidence and started rolling from there."

Stanford found some hope in the second set, which was the only set in the evening where GCU had more errors (seven) than the Cardinal (five). GCU remained in the set despite the errors but ended up falling 26-24.

In the third set, the energy shifted once again. With a 25-25 score late in the set, a pair of kills from Gianni and fellow graduate Jarrett Anderson clinched the set and a 2-1 Lopes lead.

"The energy was high, and we started making plays," Werle said. "There were four triple-block opportunities early in that first set that just didn't go our way and, when they started going our way, there was no stopping us at that point."

Gianni had his second double-double of the season, notching 17 kills and 10 digs while hitting .469.

GCU junior setter Nicholas Slight had a strong night with 43 assists and five blocks.

"I think we had phenomenal service efforts from Camden, Rico (Wardlow), Jackson (Hickman), really everybody at one point started applying the pressure," Werle said. "We had fun tonight and I think we showed what we're capable of doing, we're ready for Saturday."

The Lopes will get another shot at UCLA, with the most recent match taking place against the Bruins less than a month ago in a five-set duel that the Bruins won.

UCLA opened its MPSF tournament aspirations Thursday night when it swept USC 25-22, 25-16, 25-21.

The MPSF Championship winner will earn the league's automatic spot into the NCAA tournament, beginning April 30 at Long Beach State's Walter Pyramid.

Saturday's MPSF Championship title match will be streamed on FloVolleyball.