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A chance to wrap up titles
Water polo and tennis can win crowns; baseball, softball just need wins

by Rick Eymer

Both the Stanford baseball and softball teams will be looking for a little redemption this weekend in Pac-10 competition after suffering a series of defeats.

The baseball squad team hopes to turn its season around when it visits California for a three-game set beginning Friday at 2:30 p.m.

The softball team hopes to erase its four-game conference losing streak when it hosts UCLA on Friday at 7 p.m., and then hosts Washington on Saturday at 5 p.m. and Sunday at 1 p.m.

Meanwhile, both the Stanford women's water polo team and the women's tennis team can wrap up conference titles this weekend.

The nationally No. 1-ranked Cardinal water polo team (10-0, 21-1) travels to California for a rare night contest Friday at 7 p.m. and returns home to finish its Mountain Pacific Sports Federation season against San Jose State on Saturday at 1 p.m.

The top-ranked tennis team travels (7-0, 19-1) to Cal on Saturday at noon in their Pac-10 finale.

Stanford and California also compete against each other in women's lacrosse, men's tennis, men's crew and women's crew this weekend.

Baseball

Stanford has not dropped a season series to California since 1978, and clinched at least a series tie for the 30th consecutive year by sweeping the first three-game series between the clubs this year at Stanford in early March.

In addition, Stanford has also not lost a three-game home series to the Bears for 12 straight years.

Stanford (1-8, 15-18) would also like to improve its Pac-10 record after losing a program-worst eight straight to open conference play. The Cardinal is batting to extend its current string of 13 consecutive winning seasons. Stanford has had winning seasons in 41 of the last 42 years and 58 of the past 60.

Stanford has a .273 team batting average, eighth in the Pac-10. The club's 21 homers are seventh in the conference, while its 182 runs scored, 310 hits and 18 stolen bases are all last.

Stanford has also struggled on the mound with an uncharacteristically high ERA of 6.04 that is last in the Pac-10 and would be a school record.

Stanford ranks last in the Pac-10 in fielding percentage (.959) and has made 22 errors in its last 10 contests, including one in Tuesday night's 6-3 loss to visiting Santa Clara in a nonconference contest.

Brian Juhl had a career-high three hits, including a home run, and drove in two runs. Sean Ratliff added two hits and leads the Cardinal in home runs (6), runs scored (33), hits (40), stolen bases (8), total bases (68), slugging percentage (.519), at bats (131), games played (33) and games started (33).

Stanford has lost nine of its past 11 games.

Softball

Stanford (3-6, 27-12) has had its share of trouble recently, losing six of its plast nine since a two-game winning streak in late March.

There are several bright spots though. Freshman Alissa Haber takes an eight-game hitting streak into this weekend's action. She leads the team with a .385 batting average, one of four players over the .300 mark.

Freshmen Shannon Koplitz (.348), senior Jackie Rinehart (.331) and junior Tricia Aggabao (.300) join Haber in the .300 club.

Haber also leads the team with a .595 average (25-for-42) with runners on base and a cool .500 (13-for-26) with runners in scoring position.

Women's tennis

Cardinal senior Theresa Logar was named Pac-10 Player of the Week after helping the top-ranked Cardinal sweep UCLA and USC by 4-3 scores last weekend in Los Angeles.

Logar went 2-0 at the No. 1 position, defeating No. 22 Riza Zalameda of UCLA and No. 12 Lindsey Nelson of USC by identical 6-4, 6-4 scores. The victories were especially significant for Logar, considering she lost to both players in back-to-back matches at home in February.

Logar's two wins make her the team leader in dual-match victories (17-3), improving her overall mark to 23-7. She has won six matches in a row, owns a 14-3 mark against Pac-10 opponents and is 12-3 against nationally ranked foes.

Men's tennis

Stanford (8-15) beat visiting Pacific, 7-0, on Tuesday and then found out Wednesday that assistant coach David Hodge was named head coach of the Australian World University Games Team that will compete in Bangkok, Thailand in August.

Against the Tigers, Stanford won the doubles point and swept all six singles matches, winning five of six in straight sets.

Richard Wire and Matt Bruch reversed positions against the Tigers as Wire played No. 1 and Bruch played No. 2 for the first time this season. Wire, ranked No. 73 in the nation, beat Moritz Starke, 6-3, 7-6 while Bruch easily defeated Vladimir Zdraykovic, 6-4, 6-1.

Hodge, in his third season at as an assistant to John Whitlinger, will coach both the men's and women's teams at the World University Games. Hodge is a native of Maryborough, Queensland, Australia.

Hodge represented Australia four times as a junior competitor and spent time as the nation's No. 2 ranked Under-18 tennis player.

Synchronized swimming

Stanford travels to Indianapolis for the U.S. National Championships at the IUPUI Natatorium beginning Thursday, April 26.

The Cardinal is coming off of its third straight Collegiate National Title as it once again completed an undefeated season.

The event will facilitate the naming of the U.S. Olympic Team. Team USA will be announced and will perform an exhibition on April 28.

Women's volleyball

Stanford will host one of four regional sites for the 2007 NCAA Division I Championships, the NCAA Division I Women's Volleyball Committee announced Wednesday.

Stanford is joined by Florida, Penn State and Wisconsin as hosts for the Dec. 7-8 competition.

The NCAA Championship will be held in Sacramento at ARCO Arena, Dec. 13 and 15.

Women's soccer

Stanford's Ali Riley helped the New Zealand Women's National Team qualify for its second all-time World Cup last week, as the team tallied 21 goals in three games to complete a clean-sweep of the four-team Oceania World Cup qualifier.

Riley started all three games for New Zealand and helped the team to its first spot in the World Cup, to be held in China in September, since 1991.