A favorite son returned to the Stan Sheriff Center, but the night — and the match and playoff berth — belonged to the University of Hawai'i volleyball team.

The Warriors eased to a 30-22, 30-23, 30-22 rout of Stanford, spoiling the homecoming of outside hitter Kawika Shoji, son of Rainbow Wahine coach Dave Shoji.

By winning their ninth in a row, the Warriors moved into sixth place and clinched a berth in next week's Mountain Pacific Sports Federation playoffs.

"It feels so good," said setter Brian Beckwith, whose team improved to 12-13 overall and 10-11 in the MPSF.

Entering the final night of the regular season, UH and Cal State Northridge are tied for sixth place. But the Warriors hold the tie-breaker edge over the Matadors. If the Warriors win tonight's rematch against Stanford, they will face second-place UC Irvine next Saturday in California. If they lose and Northridge wins, the Warriors will host the play-in match Wednesday.

"Six weeks ago," UH coach Mike Wilton said, referring to when the Warriors were in 11th place, "if we were talking about the playoffs, I would have said, 'Let's talk about that later on.' This is a good turnaround by the team."

Middle blocker Dio Dante said: "Don't remind me of that. I put that behind me. It's time to look ahead."

Beckwith said he predicted the Warriors would produce a playoff surge.

"It was never a doubt we were going to get better," Beckwith said. "We knew that our hard work would soon pay off, and it's starting to in the latter part of the season, which is good."

He added: "We were drafting. These last couple of laps we're trying to make our move. It's a NASCAR analogy."

The U-turn in fortunes began last month when Wilton shuffled the lineup, using Lauri Hakala at opposite attacker, Eric Kalima at left-side hitter and freshman Ric Cervantes at libero. Also, Matt Vanzant was made a permanent left-side hitter — a position he nearly ceded after inconsistent passing in last week's two-match series against Long Beach State.

"The leash is short," said Wilton, who decided to start Vanzant last night. "But we've been on a good roll, and he's a good player."

Vanzant put down 12 kills, hitting .400, but more importantly he helped stabilize the passing and defense.

"I knew I had to play well to stay out there," Vanzant said. "I guess I did."

The Cardinal have a reputation as a disruptive serving team. But the Warriors were able to pass the Cardinal's mixture of dancing float serves and jumpers. The Warriors received 60 serves without an error.

The Warriors scored points on 45 percent of their serves (48 of 85); the Cardinal were successful 28 percent of the time (19 of 68).

"Our serving-and-passing game needed to step up," Stanford coach John Kosty said.

Evan Romero led the Cardinal with 17 kills, but he committed 10 errors. Shoji's seven kills were offset by six errors.

"We needed a little more offensively out of a couple of other guys," Kosty said. "That's something we've been battling all season."

UH's accurate passing gave Beckwith a wide menu of options. Too often Beckwith's hitters faced solo blocks. That led to several painful kills. On consecutive plays, Hakala, who finished with a match-high 19 kills, hit spikes that ricocheted off Matt Ceran's face.

Middle blocker Matt Rawson floored a kill that bounced as if it were a SuperBall.

"Consistency has been winning games for us," Dante said. "We've been better at serving and passing, for sure, that's what wins games."

Reach Stephen Tsai at stsai@honoluluadvertiser.com.