After losing the first two games of their NCAA championship match on Dec. 15 against Penn State, the Stanford women’s volleyball team battled back to tie the match and force a decisive fifth game. In the end, though, the Nittany Lions’ attack was too much for the Cardinal who lost the final game, 15-8.

Penn State (34-2) earned its second title in school history with the 30-25, 30-26, 23-30, 19-30, 15-8 marathon victory. Stanford ended its season at 32-3.

“Obviously Penn State is a great team,” head coach John Dunning said in a postgame press conference. “I’d really like to congratulate them. I thought they started the match aggressively. They got the advantage on us early — I’m not exactly clear at this point what happened. I’m proud of our team after game two to come back with the effort [that we did].”

Megan Hodge, the Nittany Lions’ star sophomore outside hitter, was named Most Outstanding Player of the tournament for her 26-kill performance in leading Penn State to its first championship since a victory over Stanford in the 1999 final.

For the Card, junior middle blocker Foluke Akinradewo — a First Team All-American and the 2007 AVCA National Player of the Year — made only one hitting error and tied freshman phenom Alix Klineman — a Second Team All-American outside hitter — with 18 kills in the final match.

Two Stanford seniors — setter Bryn Kehoe and middle blocker Franci Girard — saw their collegiate careers come to an end in their third championship match in four years on the Farm. They leave Stanford with a four-year record of 119-19.

“They’re leaders on our team,” Dunning said of his seniors. “They’re captains on our team, they’ve been to three Finals matches in their careers, and they’re just great people. They have meant a lot to our program and always will, and I am sure they will go on to great things after this.”

Kehoe leaves as the top setter in Stanford history, with 5,956 career assists. She broke her own single-season record as a senior with 1,742 and is also in the all-time top 10 in aces and digs.

Girard had her best offensive season as a senior, with 261 kills and a .317 hitting percentage. She came up with key blocks in both the Cardinal’s Regional Final win over No. 7 UCLA and an NCAA semifinal victory over No. 3 USC.

Penn State, which had not lost since a five-game thriller against Stanford in September, had swept every opponent coming into the final, including No. 4 California in the semifinal.

The first game of the championship was a close one, but Penn State scored four of the last five points in the game to win, 30-25.

The Nittany Lions built a small lead part way through the second game and, though the Cardinal came within two points several times, the advantage held. Penn State sealed the 30-26 win with a block.

Facing a must-win situation in the third game, Stanford came out firing and stunned Penn State, which had played near flawless volleyball the first two games. Up 15-13 at the midpoint, Kehoe served three aces in a row as part of a five-point run that put the game out of Penn State’s reach. The lead never dropped below four points, as a Penn State service error gave the Cardinal a 30-23 win.

With an opportunity to tie the match in the fourth game, the Cardinal powered through the frame, putting down 23 kills without making a single error. Akinradewo and junior outside hitter Cynthia Barboza both notched six kills on 10 swings in the game and Girard put each of her five attempts on the floor. Two straight ball-handling errors called on Penn State and an Akinradewo kill ended the game 30-19 and pushed the match to the decisive fifth game. The final marked the first time a championship match went the distance since rally scoring was introduced in 2001.

In the last game, however, it was Penn State with all the firepower and Stanford struggled to get a kill. The Nittany Lions strung together six points in a row to turn a 4-4 tie into a 10-4 lead and junior right side hitter Erin Waller got Stanford’s only kill of the game at 13-8. Hodge finished out the match with a kill to end the Cardinal’s title hopes.

“You know, it is such a momentum oriented game,” Dunning said. “I think we knocked them on their heels in game three and they thought they could recover and didn’t in game four. They just put their heart out on the floor, they were ready to start in game five.

“We all know that is what makes volleyball amazing to watch and play, because you get to that fifth game and who knows what is going to happen. It’s just so exciting, they just did a great job, they grabbed all the momentum and it’s hard to catch up when you get down three or four points.”

Behind Akinradewo and Klineman’s 18 kills apiece, Barboza finished with 16 and Girard had 10. Klineman also anchored Stanford in the back row with her 15 digs. Barboza chipped in 12 and freshman defensive specialists Cassidy Lichtman and Gabi Ailes added 10 each.

Along with her 62 assists, Kehoe tied a career high with five aces and led the Cardinal with seven total blocks. Though the Nittany Lions were the second-best blocking team in the nation coming in, Stanford won the blocking battle 11-8.

Stanford and Penn State are the only two teams to have participated in all 27 NCAA Tournaments. Stanford also holds the record for most Final Four appearances (17), title match appearances (13) and national championships (6).

This was the second straight year the Cardinal lost in the title game. Stanford fell to Nebraska 3-1 in last year’s championship.

“I think the goal going into next season is to win the national championship, as opposed to losing for the third straight year,” Barboza said after the final. “That would be ideal. It is just kind of a double whammy, to lose two back-to-back. [It will give us] just that much more drive for next season. “

Akinradewo finished the season with a .499 hitting percentage, a Stanford and Pac-10 single-season record, just .005 off the NCAA record. In December, she was named one of four finalists for the Honda Sports Award for Volleyball — the winner will compete for the title of Collegiate Woman Athlete of the Year in the spring.

Also this year, freshman libero Gabi Ailes broke the single-season digs record with 533.

Though the 2007 season is over, several Stanford players are keeping busy. Akinradewo has already begun training with the USA National Team, trying to earn a spot on the 2008 Olympic team. Barboza will join her in Colorado Springs in March. Both Klineman and Kehoe were among 14 players invited to a National Team tryout which began yesterday.