Washington State Volleyball kept up with No. 1 Stanford in the first set trailing by four, but stumbled in the next two, ultimately losing to the Cardinal. The Cougars (9-5, 0-2 Pac-12) battled in Maples Pavilion Friday night, with set scores of 25-21, 25-9, 25-20.

Stanford’s (12-0, 2-0 Pac-12) junior middle blocker Inky Ajanaku had a match high in kills with 11, followed by WSU sophomore outside hitter Kyra Holt with 10. Holt also led the team in digs with 12, followed by junior libero Kate Sommer with 10 digs.

WSU senior outside hitter and captain Jaicee Harris had a ground breaking night, recording her 1,000th career dig and 1,000th career kill. Harris is the fourth player in WSU history to reach that milestone. She had nine kills and six digs Friday.

Stanford’s senior libero Kyle Gilbert had a match high with 16 digs. The Cardinal totaled 47 digs and seven team blocks, while WSU had 43 digs and five blocks. Stanford also had a higher hitting percentage of .283, while WSU had .113 on the match.

During last week’s postgame interview following the loss to Washington, Head Coach Jen Greeny said the team’s defensive game hurt the offense. Against the Cardinal, WSU put up strong defensive numbers, but made a lot of errors on offense.

“It was a great job defensively and that’s what we have to do against such a great team with a lot of weapons,” said Coach Greeny in a postgame with wsucougars.com.  “We need to capitalize on the other end of it.”

WSU takes on No. 9 USC at 6 p.m. Friday at Bohler Gym. Last season, WSU claimed victory against the then No.4 Trojans at home and will be looking to repeat that effort this year. The game will be available on the Pac-12 Network and live stats will be posted on wsucougars.com.

Reporting by Bridgette Larsen