USC Returns Home For Two Top-15 Match-ups

LOS ANGELES – USC women's volleyball (11-7, 5-3 Pac-12) wraps the front half of the Pac-12 schedule as host to Bay Area foes No. 15 California (17-1, 7-1) and No. 2 Stanford (13-3, 7-1) this weekend. The Golden Bears stand atop the current league standings, and the Cardinal is the defending Pac-12 and NCAA champion. Both teams have combined for only a total of four losses this season. In a preseason poll of the conference's coaches, Stanford was picked to repeat as league champion with the Bears chosen to finish in eighth place.

MATCH #19 • Friday, Oct. 25 • 8 p.m. PT
USC (11-7, 5-3) vs. No. 15 California (17-1, 7-1)
Galen Center • Los Angeles, Calif.
SERIES RECORD: USC leads, 60-12 (.833) • LAST 10: 9-1
LAST MEETING: W, 3-1 (Oct. 28, 2018 • Galen Center)
WATCH: P12N (Anne Marie Anderson & Holly McPeak)
OPPONENT WEBSITE: CalBears.com

Match #20 • Sunday, Oct. 27 • 1 p.m. PT
USC (11-7, 5-3) vs. No. 2 Stanford (13-3, 7-1)
Galen Center • Los Angeles, Calif.
SERIES RECORD: USC trails, 25-65-1 (.283) • LAST 10: 2-8
LAST MEETING: L, 3-0 (Oct. 26, 2018 • Galen Center)
WATCH: P12N (Anne Marie Anderson & Holly McPeak)
OPPONENT WEBSITE: GoStanford.com

FIRST SERVE

Second-year USC head coach Brent Crouch is 33-18 at Troy (88-84 career).
The Trojans are 166-38 all-time at Galen Center; 5-1 this season.
Six of USC's seven losses are to teams currently ranked in the AVCA Top 25: No. 4 Texas, No. 10 Creighton, No. 16 Kentucky, No. 18 Utah, No. 22 San Diego, and No. 24 Washington State.
Each of the Trojans' last four losses have been in five-set matches. Three of the four were five-setters played on the road.
USC has employed 14 different starting lineups through 18 matches.
Sr. OH Khalia Lanier has reached double-digit kills in all 14 matches she has played in; including a stretch where she was over 20 four straight times.
So. S Raquel Lázaro is the only Trojan to have played all 73 sets this season. She leads the team with 12 double-double matches (24 in her career).

USC is 5-1 at home this season and suffered its only loss in a tight five-set contest to Washington State. The Trojans have fielded several different lineups and rotations due to injuries and player availability but look to settle in and push for the program's ninth conference title in 2019. USC holds a .683 all-time winning percentage against Pac-12 schools (520-239-2) and last won a share of the league championship in 2015. The Trojans are led by All-American outside hitters Khalia Lanier and Brooke Botkin. The USC offense is run by the 2018 Pac-12 Freshman of the Year setter Raquel Lázaro. Second-year head coach Brent Crouch led the team to its 28th straight NCAA appearance in 2018.

BUT FIRST, LET ME TAKE A #SELFIE: Get social with the Women of Troy! Fans can follow and interact with the USC women's volleyball team on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram by searching for @USCWomensVolley.

TROJAN BRIEF CASE: USC is loaded at the pins and returns a pair of All-American outside hitters in Khalia Lanier (4.39 kps) and Brooke Botkin (2.90 kps). They receive sets from the 2018 Pac-12 Freshman of the Year Raquel Lázaro (10.79 aps). All four of USC's top attackers return from last season. In the middle, senior Jasmine Gross (2.16 kps, .428) returns. Among newcomers, USC welcomes MB Madison Horin (0.81 kps, 0.86 bps), OH Kalen Owes (2.06 kps), and OPP Emilia Weske (2.18 kps) as part of a heralded freshman class. Defensively, the Trojans have employed several different liberi this season including Jenna Adams (3.16 dps) who returns this season after sitting out 2018 due to injury and Raegan LeGrand (2.37 dps) who has started seven matches this season.

LAST TIME OUT: The Women of Troy earned a pair of road victories at Oregon State (3-1) and Oregon (3-0) for the team's first 2-0 weekend of the Pac-12 season. The Trojans had dropped a five-set match in each of the previous three weekends and split to go 1-1 every time. The 3-0 sweep of the Ducks was USC's first since a sweep of Long Beach State on Sept. 20 before Pac-12 play began. In the matches, Khalia Lanier moved up two spots on USC's career ladder for kills and settled in fourth place with 1,705 after the win over Oregon. Raquel Lázaro picked up her 11th and 12th double-doubles of the season and Emilia Weske logged the first double-double of her career against the Beavers.

TOUGH SLEDDING: The Trojans played one of the toughest non-conference slates in the country in 2019. USC was one of 10 teams that began the season with back-to-back contests against teams that finished in the top 25 of the NCAA's final 2018 ratings percentage index (RPI). The Trojans were one of only three programs that tackled five straight teams that finished 2018 in the top 25. The other two programs were Texas and Creighton. Among the ranked opponents, USC met No. 3 Texas and No. 22 Texas State on opening weekend and then have No. 8 Kentucky, No. 13 Creighton, No. 16 Northern Iowa this week. USC itself was No. 9 in the final published RPI.

AVCA POLL POSITION: The Trojans opened 2019 ranked No. 14, but fell out of the poll on Sept. 30. It was USC's first time unranked in the poll since the 2017 preseason poll. That year, USC finished at No. 7 following a run to the NCAA's regional championship match. Overall, the Trojans have appeared in the poll 517 times, which ranks third all-time. USC has held a spot among the poll's top 10 teams 316 times, which ranks eighth all-time. The Trojans have also held the No. 1 ranking 47 times previously, which is sixth all-time.

PAC-12 POW(ER)S: USC players have received Pac-12 Player of the Week honors 76 times (third most among league teams). Since 2011, when the Pac-12 began honoring separate offensive and defensive players of the week and named a freshman of the week, Trojans have earned 19 offensive awards, 11 defensive awards, and taken home 19 freshman honors. On Sept. 16, Sr. MB Jasmine Gross was named Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Week for the first time in her career and OH Kalen Owes was chosen for Freshman of the Week honors.

DOUBLE DOWN: Six Women of Troy on this year's squad have recorded career double-doubles. Senior OH Khalia Lanier leads all players with 36-career double-doubles. Junior OH Brooke Botkin has 17-career double-double matches. Sophomore setter Raquel Lázaro has logged 24 double-doubles and is the owner of the first and only USC triple-double in the rally scoring era (36 assists, 16 digs, 11 blocks at Northern Iowa). Senior OPP Emily Baptista has three as a Trojan and 11-career double-doubles. Senior MB Jasmine Gross has had four. Freshman OH Kalen Owes posted her first-career double-double (18 kills, 15 digs) against Creighton on Sept. 7, and is already up to three-career double-doubles. Freshman OPP Emilia Weske picked up her first-career double-double on Oct. 18 at Oregon State.

CROUCHING TIGER: Second-year USC head coach Brent Crouch previously led Portland to its first-ever wins over ranked opponents including the very first ever; a victory against San Diego (Nov. 14, 2015). By the second week of 2018 at USC, Crouch had already led the Trojans to a win over No. 5 Kentucky and an upset of No. 4 Florida. Crouch registered his first-career 20-win season on USC's 3-2 victory over Arizona on Nov. 16, 2018, in Tucson, Ariz.

LONG DISTANCE: In 18 matches, the Trojans have played five sets five times this season and have gone 1-4 in those contests. Three of the four losses occurred on the road and the lone win was over Yale at Galen Center (Sept. 13). The most five-set matches USC has played in a single season is nine and happened three times (1980, 2007, 2010). In each of those seasons, USC went 8-1. Four other times, USC has played eight five-set matches (1993, 1995, 2017, 2018). The Trojans went 5-3 in 1993 and 1995 and were 6-2 both times in 2017 and 2018. The Women of Troy are 137-87 all-time in five-set matches: 55-29 at home; 59-45 on the road; and 23-13 in neutral locations.

TERMINAL 3: USC returns some major firepower at the pins. In 2018, OH Brooke Botkin (4.39 kps) and OH Khalia Lanier (4.27 kps) ranked third and fourth respectively in the Pac-12. OPP Emily Baptista (2.95 kps) ranked 20th. Together, the three Women of Troy accounted for 11.61 kills per set and are back together for 2019.

KILLER K: Senior OH Khalia Lanier is the first Trojan to reach the 1K mark in just her freshman and sophomore seasons. Only one other Trojan collected more than 1,000 kills in her first two seasons with the program. All-American OH Asia Kaczor did so but transferred to Troy and reached the milestone as a junior and senior. Lanier now has 1,705 (fourth place) career kills and needs 95 to climb into third place on USC's career ladder (1,799; Jennifer Kessy, 1995-98). In terms of points, Lanier already ranks third (1,908.0) in USC history. Only Samantha Bricio (2,546.5 points; 2012-15) and Alex Jupiter (2,255.5 points; 2008-11) rank higher than Lanier.

HELPING HAND: Sophomore setter Raquel Lázaro dished out 55 assists in her collegiate debut. It was the highest single-match total by a Trojan setter since 2012 (Hayley Crone). The 2018 Pac-12 Freshman of the Year got it done and ranked third in the conference in 2018 with 11.22 assists per set. She leads the Trojans with 10.79 aps in 2019. Lázaro has 2,190 career assists and is only 355 assists from moving into the top 10 of USC's career records. Currently, Sue Peters ranks 10th all-time with 2,544 assists (1989-92).

HOME, SWEET HOME: USC is 166-38 (.814) all-time at Galen Center. The Women of Troy are less than hospitable to their visitors. The Trojans went 12-1 in home matches in 2011 and completed the 2012 home schedule with a 17-1 mark. In 2007, USC was 19-0 at home on the way to an appearance in the NCAA national semifinal match. The Trojans are 20-4 all-time at Galen Center in NCAA tournament matches. The four losses were to Hawai'i (2008 and 2009) and San Diego (2018) each time in the second round; and to Washington in the 2013 NCAA Regional Final.

HEY BAY BAY!: The Trojans have a pair of players from the Bay Area. Senior libero Jenna Adams is from San Mateo and prepped at Saint Francis High School. Junior opposite hitter Candice Denny is from Saratoga and attended Archbishop Mitty High School. Both are transfers to USC. Adams spent one season at Ohio State and Denny spent two at Arizona.

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Players Mentioned

Jenna Adams

Emily Baptista

Brooke Botkin

Candice Denny

Jasmine Gross

Madison Horin

Khalia Lanier

Raegan LeGrand

Kalen Owes

Emilia Weske