No. 11 USC Closes Regular Season with 3-1 Win

  0 Wendy Mayer | April 09th, 2017 | College - Men's Indoor, MPSF

Match Stats

  • No. 11 USC 3, Cal Baptist 1 (25-17, 21-25, 25-21, 25-21)
  • USC moves to 14-13, 8-10 MPSF; Cal Baptist falls to 7-20, 2-16 MPSF
  • Riverside, California
  • Attendance: 418
  • Box Score

No. 11 USC rode the arm of senior outside hitter Lucas Yoder to the tune of 24 kills in a 3-1 win over Cal Baptist on Saturday to wrap the regular season. The Trojans won the match 25-17, 21-25, 25-21, 25-21.

Both teams hit at a high efficiency with USC turning in a .407 effort, while Cal Baptist hit at a .313 clip. The Lancers outblocked the Trojans 8-4, but USC won the rest of the stat sheet.

Yoder’s match high 24 kills on a .452 hitting outing paced the Trojan attack, while his eight digs also were a team high. Sophomore outside Gianluca Grasso chipped in 11 kills and five digs, while sophomore middle blocker Connor Inlow and senior middle Andy Benesh rounded out the offense with eight putaways each. Inlow was a perfect 8-for-8 on the night. Sophomore libero Matt Douglas pulled up eight digs to tie Yoder for the team lead.

Senior outside Luis Palos paced the Lancers with 11 kills, while also adding a team-best five digs. Junior opposite Kevin Vaz registered 10 kills and a team-leading four blocks, while junior middle Enrique Garcia added 10 kills on a team-best .421 hitting night. Junior outside Rohit Paul downed seven kills, while senior middle Caleb Miller put up four blocks in his career finale.

USC hit .500 in the opening stanza as Yoder set the tone for the evening with the first three kills of the night as the Trojans stormed ahead 6-2. Cal Baptist was back within two at 10-8 and remained close until the USC put together an 8-2 run to vault ahead 20-12. Three kills and a block by Benesh aided the rally. The Lancers scored five of the next seven, but an ace by Yoder and kill by Ryan Moss ended the set.

Cal Baptist led it 16-12 midway through Set 2. Palos had three kills and a block in the stretch, which also saw the Trojans commit six errors. Three straight Trojan miscues pushed the Lancer lead to five at 21-16. A service error put CBU up 24-19. A Palos kill tied the match at a set apiece three points later. CBU outhit USC .348 to .154 in the stanza.

The Trojans turned up the offense in Set 3, hitting at a .519 clip. After splitting the first 18 points, USC jumped ahead 16-12 to force a Cal Baptist timeout. Two kills each by Garcia and Paul cut the margin to two at 21-19. Grasso turned in two kills and a block down the stretch in the 25-21 win.

Yoder dropped four more kills as USC went ahead 9-5 in Set 4. Another Yoder putaway made it 15-9 Trojans. USC pushed the margin to eight at 20-12 as Ryan Moss, Yoder and Benesh supplied the offense. Cal Baptist battled back with four of the next five points, including two Garcia kills. Down 23-16, the Lancers again rallied, this time with a 4-0 run, including a kill and an ace by Garcia, to pull within three at 23-20. Yoder wrapped up the night with two of the final three points. The Trojans hit .444 in the final stanza.

PRESS RELEASES

Courtesy: USC  Athletics

The No. 11-ranked USC men’s volleyball team, behind Lucas Yoder’s 24 kills and 8 digs, concluded its regular season schedule with a 25-17, 21-25, 25-21, 25-21 win at Cal Baptist in a Mountain Pacific Sports Federation match on Saturday (April 8).

With the victory, USC doubled its overall win total from a year ago as it improved to 14-13 on the year and it finished MPSF play at 8-10 in a 3-way tie for sixth place (with Pepperdine and Stanford). Cal Baptist ended its 2017 season at 7-20 overall and 2-16 in the MPSF.

The Trojans are now headed to the 8-team MPSF Tournament as the eighth seed. They will face top-seeded Long Beach State, the nation’s No. 1-ranked team, in quarterfinal action on Saturday (April 15) at 7 p.m. at the Pyramid in Long Beach. USC gave the 49ers one of their 3 losses this year with a 4-set home victory in mid-January.

Tonight was USC’s second consecutive 3-1 victory over Cal Baptist, as the teams also played on Thursday (April 6) in USC’s Galen Center.

Yoder hit .452 in the tonight’s match. Gianluca Grasso added 11 kills for USC, Connor Inlow and Andy Benesh each had 8 kills and Matt Douglas had 8 digs.

For Cal Baptist, Luis Palos had 11 kills, while Kevin Vaz and Enrique Garcia each had 10 kills. Vaz added 4 blocks, as did Caleb Miller.

USC hit .407 in the match to CBU’s .313. The Trojans had more digs (34 to 28), but the Lancers outblocked Troy, 8.5 to 4.0.

USC jumped out to a 4-0 lead in the opening set and continued to pull away while hitting .500. Cal Baptist went on a 3-0 run to open a 10-7 lead in the second set and USC couldn’t catch up. The Trojans scored back-to-back points to break a 9-9 tie in the third set and were able to hold that margin the rest of the way as they hit .519. USC got out to a quick 4-1 lead in the fourth set and kept building on it while hitting .444 to finish out the match.

 

Courtesy: Cal Baptist Athletics

RIVERSIDE, Calif. — In its final Mountain Pacific Sports Federation match, California Baptist University did what it has done all year: battle. The Lancers put up another fight Saturday night against No. 11-ranked USC, but dropped the match 3-1 (25-17, 21-25, 25-21, 25-21).

CBU drops to 7-21 on the year and finishes conference with a 2-16 mark. The Trojans improve to 14-13 overall and 8-10 in conference.

The Lancers out-blocked the Trojans for the second night in a row, posting eight blocks to Troy’s four. Caleb Miller and Kevin Vaz each finished with four total blocks, including one solo stuff a piece. Luis Palos led with 11 kills, while Vaz chipped in 10 more. Defensively, Palos, Robert Hadobas and Emmett Enriques each posted five kills.

After going down a set, CBU rallied in the second to even the match at 1-1.

The set started pretty even before the Lancers jumped out to a 10-7 lead off a kill from Palos, a USC error and a combo block from Vaz, Miller and Palos. CBU extended that lead to five points, 21-16, off three-straight USC errors. The Lancers reached set point on a Trojan service error and Palos sealed the 25-21 victory with a kill.

Both teams battled for the upper hand in the swing set, with the score being tied eight times and the lead exchanging four times before USC managed to get some separation, 16-12.

The Lancers called a timeout and pulled back within three, but it was the closest they would get as USC took the set 25-21.

Down 23-16 in the fourth, CBU launched a ferocious comeback attempt. Enrique de Diego Garcia sparked a 4-0 run to put the Lancers within three points. It started with a Garcia kill and followed with a Garcia ace, before a USC error and a solo block from Jackson Burge put CBU within 23-20.

The Trojans cut the run before CBU could get too much momentum and sealed the match win with a 25-21 fourth-set victory.

CBU concludes the season Wednesday with a nonconference matchup with UC San Diego at 7:00 p.m.

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About Wendy Mayer

Wendy Mayer

Wendy Mayer has worked in athletics media relations for the last 20 years. The Northwest Missouri State alumna is currently senior writer for Volleymob.com after spending the last 15 years with Purdue athletics.

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