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By Rick Eymer
Palo Alto Online Sports

Nationally No. 2-ranked Stanford received the second overall seed for the upcoming NCAA women's volleyball tournament and will host the first two rounds this weekend.

The Cardinal (27-3) meets Jackson State (24-11) on Friday at 8 p.m. Western Kentucky and Loyola Marymount play in the other first-round match at 5:30 p.m. The winners play at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday in Maples Pavilion.

The Tigers, who lost their first six matches, won the Southwestern Athletic Conference title for the second straight season.

Should Stanford win twice, it will travel to Berkeley for regional play. California, one of seven Pac-12 teams to make the tournament, plays North Carolina this weekend at Iowa State. The Hawkeyes and Indiana-Fort Wayne also will play.

Penn State was awarded the overall No. 1 seed. The Nittany Lions, who handed Stanford one of its three losses, have won four national titles in the past five years.

Stanford senior Jessica Walker is the only player on the team to have experienced a Final Four, though the five freshmen, generally regarded as the top recruiting class in the nation, gained plenty of experience getting through a tough preseason schedule and the Pac-12 schedule.

"The freshman have matured over the year and proven they can play at this level," Cardinal coach John Dunning said. "We've had a blessed season so far. We've learned so much and grown so much. Confidence comes from success."

Stanford already has played seven of the 16 nationally seeded teams and is 9-2 against them. The Cardinal is 14-3 against the field.

Defending national champion and No. 7 seed UCLA meets Long Island-Brooklyn in the first round, also as part of the Berkeley region.

USC, which knocked off the Cardinal during conference play, received the No. 6 overall seed and meets Fairfield in the first round of the Austin region.

No. 4 Washington, No. 5 Oregon and Arizona State all were assigned to the Omaha region. The Huskies, with freshman Melanie Wade from Palo Alto High, meet Central Arkansas; Oregon plays Northern Colorado and the Sun Devils take on Oklahoma in first-round matches.

"It was tough getting through the conference this year," Dunning said. "One loss through Pac-12 to me is not what you would have expected. The league was so even this year you couldn't predict any team would do that."

Penn State, one of seven Big 10 teams to reach the postseason, and Stanford are the only teams to have qualified for all 32 NCAA tournaments.

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