No. 16 USC Women's Volleyball Wins Battle of LA in Five-Setter Over UCLA

Sunday, October 13

Los Angeles, Calif.

4:30 p.m.

USC

12-4,4-2Big Ten

UCLA

8-7,2-4Big Ten

UCLA

Southern California

Photo by: Drake Lee

No. 16 USC Women's Volleyball Wins Battle of LA in Five-Setter Over UCLA

October 13, 2024 | Women's Volleyball

Box Score Box Score

The Trojans set a home attendance record as 7,303 fans watched the Women of Troy take down the Bruins at Galen Center

LOS ANGELES – The 16th-ranked USC women's volleyball team (12-4, 4-2 Big Ten) rallied for a five-set win (25-16, 18-25, 19-25, 25-21, 15-11) to take down crosstown rival UCLA (8-7, 2-4) in the Battle of LA at Galen Center on Sunday, Oct. 13. The Trojans and Bruins played in front of record-setting USC home crowd of 7,303 fans.

KEY PLAYERS

Gr. OH Ally Batenhorst recorded her fifth double-double of the season (seventh career) and finished with her 16th match in double-digit kills at 13 (5e, 36) with .222 hitting and 11 digs. Batenhorst was the team's porter with 52 service receptions and added four blocks and served a pair of aces to finish with 17.0 points.
Sr. S Mia Tuaniga dished out 40 assists and had six digs, four blocks, and matched her season high with five kills (1e, 9att) as she hit .444. She added a service ace for 8.0 points and set the Trojans to a .203 hitting performance.
Redshirt Fr. MB Leah Ford set new career marks in kills (10) and attacks (18) and matched her career high with five digs. She hit .500 and collected a match-high seven blocks (one solo).
Fr. OPP Jadyn Livings had nine kills, five digs, three blocks, and put up a pair of assists.
Jr. LIB Gala Trubint led USC with 13 digs for her 59th-career match in double-digit digs and added three assists and a season-high three service aces.
Redshirt So. OH Adonia Faumuina had eight kills and two digs.
For the Bruins, Kiki Horne led with 17 kills. Cheridyn Leverette had 16 kills. Audrey Pak put up 44 assists and had eight digs and five blocks. Anna Dodson put up four blocks and had seven kills.

HOW IT HAPPENED

The Trojans hit .588 and racked up four service aces and three blocks to take a 25-16 first-set win. Livings led the way with four kills on five swings while Tuaniga scored on three kills and got in on a pair of blocks. Two Bruins had three kills apiece, but UCLA hit .000 with eight kills and eight errors on 19 swings.
UCLA fired back to take set two, 25-18, as Horne collected four more kills and Dodson added three. Batenhorst had three kills, but the Trojans hit .065 in the second frame with nine kills and seven errors on 31 swings. The Bruins produced 12 kills on 31 swings with five errors to log a .226 attack rate.
The teams were tied 12 times, and the lead changed hands six times in the third before UCLA went up, 2-1, with a 25-19 win. Leverette had seven kills and Horne added four more as the Bruins hit .256 with 14 kills on 39 attacks. The Trojans got four kills from Faumuina and four from Ford but hit .179 in the loss.
USC led set four by as many as 10 points but couldn't slam the door as the Bruins pushed back to get within three at set point (24-21) before the Trojans closed out a 25-21 win to force set five. USC put up four blocks and got a pair of service aces but were aided by a .000 hitting performance by the Bruins. Both teams had 11 kills each, but USC hit .118 on the way to fifth-set freedom.
The Women of Troy trailed by as many as four points, 6-2, in the fifth, but closed to within three at the side switch. From there, USC ripped through a 10-3 run to close out a 15-11 win to take the match. Batenhorst poured in four kills in the fifth and helped lift the Trojans to a .222 hitting rate (6k, 2e, 18att). USC also had two blocks and a pair of aces in the fifth.

UP NEXT

The Trojans head to the East Coast for the season's longest road trip next week. USC will take on Maryland (10-7, 1-5 Big Ten) at the XFINITY Center in College Park, Md., on Friday (Oct. 18) at 7 p.m. ET (4 p.m. PT) and then head north to face Rutgers (5-12, 0-6) at Jersey Mike's Arena in Piscataway, N.J., on Sunday (Oct. 20) at 1 p.m. ET (10 a.m. PT). Both matches will be shown live on Big Ten Plus (B1G+).

MATCH NOTES

USC improved to 65-58 all-time against UCLA and moved to 25-25 in home matches against the Bruins. The Women of Troy have won six of the last eight meetings with their crosstown rival.
The Trojans played their fourth five-set match of the season and improved to 4-0. All-time, the Trojans moved to 156-108 in five-set matches with a 66-40 mark at home. Against Big Ten foes, USC improved to 46-39 in five-setters.
Against UCLA specifically, USC improved to 24-14 in five-set matches with an 8-7 mark when they play five sets at home. Head coach Brad Keller is 4-1 in five-set matches against the Bruins.
The Trojans won their ninth straight home match and improved to 213-57 all-time at Galen Center.
USC and UCLA played in front of record-setting Trojans' home crowd of 7,303 fans. The night's attendance was also the most in the all-time series, which broke a mark of 7,216 set at Pauley Pavilion in 2022 (Sept. 22).
Prior to the start of the match, a special moment of silence was held in memory of the life of Annie Marie Montgomery Clausen, a member of the 2003 Trojans' NCAA championship team. Montgomery passed in June following a four-year bout with cancer.

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