MALIBU, California – Alex Gettinger knocked down a season-high 15 kills as the #8 Pepperdine men's volleyball team opened its two-match series against #12 Stanford with a three-set sweep, 25-18, 25-19, 25-19, in Mountain Pacific Sports Federation play on Thursday night.
 
The Waves (15-9, 6-5) had seven service aces and hit .419, while Stanford (12-12, 4-7) was held to .259 hitting.
 
BIG WAVES

• Graduate outside hitter Alex Gettinger (Wildwood, Mo./Lafayette HS) finished one kill shy of his career high of 16 set against Concordia in 2020. He hit .500 (15-3-24) tonight and also had seven digs.
• Graduate outside hitter Spencer Wickens (Irondequoit, N.Y./McQuaid Jesuit HS) moved back to outside hitter after primarily playing libero the past few weeks. He had seven kills and a match-high nine digs.
• Sophomore setter Bryce Dvorak (Newport Beach, Calif./Corona del Mar HS) handed out 34 assists and had four service aces.
• Sophomore libero Trey Cole (Long Island, N.Y./Connetquot HS) contributed eight digs.
• Senior middle blocker JT Martin (Fort Lauderdale, Fla./Cardinal Gibbons HS) made his first start in more than two years and had five kills on nine errorless swings.
• Graduate middle blocker Austin Wilmot (Valley Village, Calif./Crespi Carmelite HS/UC Irvine) had seven kills on nine attempts.

PLAY BY PLAY
 
The Waves scored the first two points of the first set and led the entire way. A block by Wilmot and graduate opposite Jaylen Jasper (Annapolis, Md./Stanford) made it 6-3, a kill by Wickens put Pepperdine up 9-4, and kills by Jasper and Gettinger extended the lead to 11-5. The difference later grew to seven at 17-10 after a Stanford attack error, and that would be the final margin after Gettinger ended the first set with a kill.
 
Stanford jumped out to a 4-1 lead in the second set, but the Waves quickly righted the ship and took a 7-5 advantage after a Wickens kill. At 12-11, Gettinger reeled off four consecutive kills to put the Waves up by five. The teams traded sideouts for a while until Dvorak had a service ace to make it 24-18, and the second set ended two points later on a Stanford service error.
 
The Cardinal took a few three-point leads midway through set number three, the last at 13-10. But Pepperdine went on a 5-1 run that included two kills from Jasper and an ace by Martin. Stanford's last lead came at 17-16 but Pepperdine scored four straight, including a kill by Gettinger, an ace by Wickens and a block by Wilmot and Dvorak. At 22-19, the match ended on a 3-0 Pepperdine run thanks to a kill by Wickens, a Stanford attack error and a Dvorak service ace.
 
MATCH STATS 

• PEPP hitting: .419 overall (.571 set one, .290 set two, .455 set three)
• STAN hitting: .259 overall (.045 set one, .324 set two, .346 set three)
• Service Aces: PEPP 7, STAN 2
• Digs: PEPP 32, STAN 21
• Blocks: PEPP 4.0, STAN 4.0
• Stanford was led by Will Rottman's nine kills.

UP NEXT
 
Saturday's second match against the Cardinal will be the regular-season finale and Senior Night for the Waves. It starts at 6 p.m. The match will be streamed via WaveCasts on the WCC Network. Ticket information and COVID-19 entry policies for Firestone Fieldhouse can be found here.