Abercrombie and Lanier Named to Pac-12 All-Conference Team

SAN FRANCISCO – USC women's volleyball senior opposite hitter Brittany Abercrombie (Carlsbad, Calif./La Costa Canyon HS) and sophomore outside hitter Khalia Lanier (Scottsdale, Ariz./Xavier College Prep) were each named to the Pac-12 All-Conference Team on Tuesday, Nov. 28. Senior opposite hitter Niki Withers (Long Beach, Calif./Long Beach Poly HS) received all-conference honorable mention. Both Abercrombie (2015) and Lanier (2016) earn their second-career all-conference team honors.

The selections of Abercrombie and Lanier bring USC's all-time total to 73 All-Pac-12 certificates awarded to 37 different Women of Troy. Including all-conference selections preceding the Pac-12, Trojans now hold 96 all-league recognitions since 1977.

Voted on by the league's head coaches, the Pac-12 honored Oregon State's Mark Barnard as the Coach of the Year and the Beavers' freshman setter Kylee McLaughlin as the Freshman of the Year. The other three awards all went to student-athletes from conference champion Stanford. Outside hitter Kathryn Plummer was chosen as the Player of the Year, Morgan Hentz was named the league's Libero of the Year, and Jenna Gray was chosen as the Setter of the Year.

Abercrombie was named the Pac-12 Offensive Player of the Week twice this fall (Sept. 25 and Oct. 2). She was also chosen as the espnW National Player of the Week on Oct. 3. Abercrombie set new single-match career marks for kills (19), attacks (56), blocks (9), and points (20.0) this season. She has also reached the 986 career kills mark and needs just 14 to become the 16th player in program history to cross the 1,000-career kills plateau.

Lanier was chosen for Pac-12 Offensive Player of the Week honors three times this season (Aug. 28, Nov. 13, and Nov. 27). She was also named the AVCA National Player of the Week on Nov. 14. Lanier, a member of the Pac-12 Preseason All-Conference Team, was also a member of each of USC's pre-conference all-tournament teams and earned MVP honors at the USC/LMU Tournament to open the season. Lanier ranks in the Pac-12's top 10 for kills (4.10 kps) and points (4.66 pps) this season.

Withers received her first-career Pac-12 postseason honor. She was part of the Big West Conference's all-freshman team in 2014 as a student-athlete at Cal State Fullerton. Including kills she earned as a Titan, Withers collected her 1,000th career kill in USC's win over Oregon (Nov. 22). This season, she ranks third on the team in kills (2.55 kps) and registers 0.44 blocks per set.

14th-ranked USC (22-9) received the 10th seed into the 2017 NCAA Division I Women's Volleyball Championship and will host first- and second-round matches at Galen Center this week. The Trojans open their tournament run against Southland Conference champion Central Arkansas (27-4) on Friday (Dec. 1) at 7 p.m. PT. In the other first-round match, San Diego (24-4) faces Louisiana State (20-9) at 5 p.m. Winners of the two first-round matches will meet on Saturday (Dec. 2) at 5 p.m. in the second round. All matches will be streamed live on the USC Pac-12+ platform at http://www.pac-12.com/live/usc.

For more information on the USC women's volleyball team and a complete schedule and results, please visit USCTrojans.com. To purchase tickets, please visit USCTrojans.com/tickets. Fans of the Women of Troy can follow @USCWomensVolley on Periscope, Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, and Instagram.

Players Mentioned

Brittany Abercrombie

Khalia Lanier

Niki Withers