USC Women's Volleyball Heads to Honolulu for Two with Hawai'i

HONOLULU – The USC women's volleyball team (1-2) heads to the islands for a pair of matchups with Hawai'i (2-1) at SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center this week (Aug. 30 and Sept. 2). The Women of Troy are coming off a 3-0 sweep of Southern Mississippi and look to carry the momentum from that victory into meetings with the Rainbow Wahine. USC has paid a visit to the islands in each of the past two seasons and has earned splits with UH both times.

The Trojans are 24-14 all-time in the state of Hawai'i and are 15-13 when they face the Rainbow Wahine at Stan Sheriff Center. In fact, USC is 6-4 in its last 10 matches with UH on the islands.

USC at Hawai'i

SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center • Honolulu, Hawai'i
MATCH #4 • Thursday, Aug. 31 • 10 p.m. HT (7 p.m. PT)
MATCH #5 • Saturday, Sept. 2 • 10 p.m. HT (7 p.m. PT)
SERIES RECORD: USC trails, 20-24 (.0455)
LAST MEETING: L 3-2 (Sept. 10, 2022 • Honolulu, Hawai'i)
STREAK: Lost 1 • LAST 10 MEETINGS: 4-6
TV/STREAM: Spectrum OC16/ESPN+
OPPONENT WEBSITE: HawaiiAthletics.com

FIRST SERVE (TL;DR)

USC is led by fourth-year head coach Brad Keller who has the unique experience of having also served as an assistant coach for the USC men. Keller is 45-36 (.556) at Troy.
The Trojans play seven of their 10 non-conference matches on the road and will fly 7,900 miles through the air before they play at Galen Center (Sept. 8).
The Women of Troy are 24-14 all-time in the Aloha State. They are 15-13 in Honolulu when they play the Rainbow Wahine and have won six of the last 10 meetings as the visiting team with Hawai'i.
Sr. OH Skylar Fields has racked up three matches in double-digit kills to pick up where she left off in 2022 when she was chosen for AVCA All-America first-team honors. She ranks third in the Pac-12 at 4.90 kills per set.
Sr. OH Skylar Fields and Jr. S Mia Tuaniga were each named to the Pac-12 Preseason All-Conference Team.
Assistant coach Garrett Geiger was a member of the Hawai'i men's volleyball team in 2020.
Associate head coach Spencer McLachlin grew up in Hawai'i where he attended the Punahou School. His father Chris McLachlin is a longtime color analyst for UH volleyball broadcasts and was a volleyball and basketball coach at Punahou. Spencer's mother Beth (Hollinger) McLachlin earned All-America honors as a volleyball player at Hawai'i.

LAST TIME OUT: USC opened the season on the road against a pair of ranked foes in Texas. The Trojans lost to No. 19-ranked Houston in four sets and fell to 38-10 all-time in season openers and then dropped a straight-set match to No. 23 Rice the next night. The Women of Troy bounced back and picked up a 3-0 win over Southern Mississippi on their final day in the Lone Star State and returned from the trip with a 32-8 all-time record in the state of Texas. Senior OH Skylar Fields picked up where she left off last season when she was named an AVCA first-team All-American and racked up three straight matches in double-digit kills.

ISLAND LIFE: USC holds a 24-14 all-time record in matches played in the state of Hawai'i. The Trojans are 15-13 against the Rainbow Wahine in Honolulu. USC famously played at Stan Sheriff Center in the 2011 NCAA Regional Championship when it went five sets with host UH and won, and then took down Pepperdine in another five-set thriller to advance to the NCAA national semifinal.

'OHANA MEANS FAMILY: USC associate head coach Spencer McLachlin grew up in Hawai'i where he attended the Punahou School. His father Chris McLachlin is a longtime color analyst for UH volleyball broadcasts and was a volleyball and basketball coach at Punahou where he coached President Barack Obama. Spencer's mother Beth (Hollinger) McLachlin was an All-American volleyball player at Hawai'i and was a co-captain of the U.S. Olympic team. She served 23 years as the director of athletics at La Pietra Hawai'i School for Girls.

CROSS-PACIFIC: USC has had three letterwinners hail from the Aloha State: Claudia McKibbin (1980), Julie Morgan (1976), and Lindy Vivas (1976).

PAC-12 EARLY RETURNS: Sr. OH Skylar Fields and Jr. setter Mia Tuaniga were each chosen to the Pac-12 Preseason All-Conference Team. Both were All-Pac-12 selections to end the 2022 season. Fields later earned AVCA All-America first-team laurels. Tuaniga received All-America honorable mention. In a poll of the league's head coaches, the Trojans were picked to finish in fourth place.

TIME TO PAC IT UP: The Women of Troy will be playing their final season in the Pac-12 Conference. On June 30, 2022, USC and UCLA both announced that the schools' athletic programs would join the Big Ten Conference in 2024. Since that time, Oregon and Washington also made similar announcements and all four teams will now compete in the Big Ten for most sports.

SIDELINE SHUFFLE: Besides fourth-year head coach Brad Keller, the other three coaches on the Trojans' bench will be new faces. Spencer McLachlin joins the program as its associate head coach after a stint in the same position at Indiana. Megan Moenoa previously coached at UC Irvine but took a hiatus from coaching and now returns to the court as a USC assistant. Former practice player Garrett Geiger gets his collegiate start in coaching as the Trojans' fourth coach. McLachlin was a national champion athlete at Stanford and has previously coached at UCLA and California. Moenoa was a standout setter at UCLA and is quite familiar with the USC-UCLA rivalry on the women's side. Geiger played at Hawai'i but returned to USC to complete his undergraduate studies and retired from playing.

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Players Mentioned

Skylar Fields

Mia Tuaniga