No. 22 USC Women's Volleyball Takes Five-Set Win Over San Diego

Saturday, September 6

Los Angeles, Calif.

7:00 p.m. PT

USC

4-0,0-0Big Ten

San Diego

3-2,0-0WCC

San Diego

Southern California

The USC women's volleyball team huddles to celebrate a point in a match against UC Santa Barbara at the Galen Center

Photo by: Cary Qian

No. 22 USC Women's Volleyball Takes Five-Set Win Over San Diego

September 06, 2025 | Women's Volleyball

Box Score Press Conference

Four Trojans reached double-digit kills in a win over the Toreros

LOS ANGELES – The No. 22-ranked USC women's volleyball team (4-0) claimed a five-set win (15-25, 25-21, 25-18, 22-25, 16-14) against San Diego (3-2) in its second match in the Trojan Invitational at Galen Center on Saturday, Sept. 6.

KEY PLAYERS

Fr. OPP Abigail Mullen racked up her second double-double with 13 kills (4e, 39att, .231) and 15 digs to go with three blocks and two service aces.
Redshirt So. OH London Wijay recorded her first double-double of the season (10th career) and finished with 14 kills (4e, 31att) with .323 hitting and did it with 10 digs and a pair of blocks.
Fr. S Reese Messer put up 40 assists to go with eight digs, four blocks (one solo), and six kills (1e, 10att, .500).
Fr. LIB Taylor Deckert earned the first double-double of her career on 13 digs and 10 assists to go with a service ace.
So. MB Mia Tvrdy reached double digits for the first time to post a new career high of 10 kills (2e, 15att) on .533 hitting and led all Trojans with five blocks.
Redshirt Jr. OH Adonia Faumuina led all USC hitters with 16 kills and had four blocks, a dig, and a service ace.
For the Toreros, Isabel Clark led with 21 kills (8e, 52att) and .250 hitting to go with eight digs. Kali Engeman put up 11 kills (2e, 17att, .529) and had a match-high seven blocks (one solo). Olivia Bennett led all players with 17 digs. Nemo Beach recorded nine kills and had three digs and a service ace.

HOW IT HAPPENED

Despite a slow start, the Women of Troy won the hitting game with a .234 edge over .218 by USD. USC also had more kills (62-52), and a slight edge in blocks (12.5-12.0). Both teams had five service aces, but the Trojans had 19 errors to the 11 San Diego errors in the match.
The Toreros grabbed a 25-15 first-set win as USC fought through rotation issues, which surrendered four service aces to San Diego in the first eight rallies. Mullen racked up eight of her digs in the opening frame as the Trojans tried to chip away, but USC's .000 hitting under San Diego's .242 (12k, 4e, 33att) put USC in a hole too big to dig out of. Following a four-all tie, the Toreros rolled through a 10-0 run to take the lead for good.
It took a Herculean effort, but the Trojans fell behind, 17-10, when USD ripped through a 9-1 run only to respond with an 8-0 burst of their own to seize the last of four lead changes. The score was tied for the 13th time at 20-all before USC moved ahead, 22-20, with back-to-back kills on jousts. The Trojans completed the comeback on what would amount to a 15-4 run to close out a 25-21 win. Wijay collected seven of her kills in the frame while Faumuina had four to lift the Trojans to a .250 hitting rate (14k, 5e, 36att). Deckert dug up six balls to help USC keep the Toreros at .114 hitting.
San Diego grabbed an early lead in the third, but the Trojans used a 6-0 run to go in front, 12-8, on a back row kill from Wijay. USC stayed its course and walked away with a 25-18 win to take the third for a 2-1 lead in the match. Faumuina had five kills and led a USC attack that hit .384 (17k, 5e, 33att) in the frame. The Trojans put up four blocks in set three including one by Messer and Tvrdy to sew up the win.
The Trojans led by as many as three in the fourth set, 15-12 and 17-14, but the Toreros mounted a late comeback and used a 6-1 run to close a 25-22 win to take the match to a fifth frame. USD hit .318 in the fourth and got five kills from Clark. USC got five from Mullen and three apiece from Faumuina and Tvrdy in the loss.
USD raced out to a 10-5 lead in the fifth set when Engeman scored on back-to-back slide attacks, but the Trojans chipped away and pulled within two at 12-10 on a 5-2 run before drawing even at 14-all. Sr. LIB Gala Trubint stepped in to serve an ace to give the Trojans a 15-14 lead before Wijay sent the final ball off Torero hands for a kill and the win. USC hit .562 in the final set (10k, 1e, 16att) and got four of those from Mullen and three from Wijay.

UP NEXT

USC concludes the Trojan Invitational with a match against 13th-ranked Creighton (3-2) at 1 p.m. PT on Sunday (Sept. 7). The Trojans and Bluejays will be shown live nationally on a Big Ten Network production. Following the USC-Creighton match, UC Santa Barbara (2-2) and San Diego (3-2) will close the tournament with a match at 4 p.m.

MATCH NOTES

USC improved to 14-4 all-time against San Diego and has won each of the last two meetings.
The Trojans moved to 4-0 under Brad Keller for the second time (2022).
USC reached double-digit blocks (12.5) for the third time. The Trojans had double-digit blocks 20 times in 2024.
The Trojans played their second five-set match (2-0) of the season and improved to 159-110 in five-setters all-time (69-41 at home). The match was USC's sixth five-set match with San Diego, as it improved to 4-2 in those contests.
USC played five-set matches on back-to-back nights for the first time since 2018 (Sept. 7-8) and for the 11th time in program history. It was the fifth time that the Trojans have won five-set matches on back-to-back nights all-time and the first since 2002 (Oct. 4 at Stanford and Oct. 5 at California).
The Women of Troy moved to 3-0 at home this season and to 219-60 all-time in the arena (since 2006).

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, TikTok, and Instagram.