DURHAM, N.C. – Led by freshman Hayley Hodson and redshirt sophomore Merete Lutz, the third-ranked Stanford women's volleyball team outlasted Duke, 25-17, 22-25, 25-17, 23-25, 15-10, Friday, in Cameron Indoor Stadium in Durham, North Carolina. The Cardinal improves to 4-2 overall, while the Blue Devils fall to 4-3.
Hodson paced the team with a career high 17 kills on a .333 attack percentage to go with 12 digs. Lutz added 15 kills and four blocks. Senior outside hitter Brittany Howard also tallied a double-double with 11 kills and 13 digs.
Senior setter Madi Bugg, who hails from Apex, North Carolina, controlled the offense with 44 assists and 14 digs for her second double-double of the season. Freshman libero Halland McKenna anchored the defense with 23 digs for her first 20-plus dig performance of her career.
Redshirt sophomore Ivana Vanjak, playing in just her sixth match as a middle blocker, led all players with a career high 11 blocks to go with seven kills. Senior outside hitter Jordan Burgess finished with four kills and a season-best 18 digs.
As a team, Stanford out hit Duke .234 to .189 and led the Blue Devils in the block column, 15.0 to 4.0.
Duke's Emily Sklar led all players with 27 kills and 12 digs. Libero Sasha Karelov finished with 29 digs, while Kelli Kalinoski totaled 26 digs for the Blue Devils. Setter Maggie Deichmeister racked up 63 assists and 13 digs in the loss.
Leading the match 2-1, Stanford fell behind 18-10 in the fourth set. A 12-4 Cardinal run, tied it 22-22, but the Blue Devils reeled off a 4-1 run of their own to force a fifth set. Stanford again fell behind early, but was able to capitalize on Duke's errors and rely on Lutz to close out the set and the match.
Stanford returns to The Farm next week to close out the nonconference portion of its schedule against Pacific on Friday, Sept. 18 and Saint Mary's on Saturday's Sept. 19. Both matches are slated for 7 p.m. in Maples Pavilion.