The No. 4 USC Trojans came in and handed Utah its first conference loss, sweeping the Utes (22-25, 21-25, 13-25) Sunday. Despite keeping pace in the first and second sets, the Utes lost decisively in the third. However, Utah head coach Beth Launiere kept a positive outlook.
“I feel really good about the first two sets,” Launiere said. “I thought we were on point for point with them, neither one [of us] was going to break away.”
Junior outside hitter Shelby Dalton had the team-high 10 kills with a .409 hitting percentage. Dalton explained that some minor mishaps kept Utah from stealing sets from USC.
“We just had little things,” Dalton said. “Like balls dropping between players, not getting good blocks or missing our serves. It’s just those little things that towards the end of the game they start to catch up with you and that’s what happened.”
Utah outside hitter Makenzie Moea’i, who was held to a season-low 2 kills, hit a serve out of bounds to end the first set in favor of USC. The Trojans’ sophomore outside hitter Samantha Bricio, had a match-high 16 total kills, including nine in the first set.
The Utes battled back for a chance to win the second set. Utah right side hitter Alli Spurrier had six kills with a .333 hitting percentage and 3 blocks to help close the late gap. After her fifth kill, Spurrier followed up with a block to draw the Utes within two at 19-21. The Trojans responded with three straight kills, making it 19-24.
Utah’s outside hitter Morgan Odale came up with two straight kills to stave off two Trojan set points. She finished with eight kills on the night. Finally, USC ended the Utes comeback campaign with a kill to seal the second set 21-25, taking a 2-0 advantage.
“We worked on consistency in practice and playing really good volleyball,” Spurrier said. “I think we kept that up for the first two sets.”
Utah had 16 blocks on the night. Junior Bailey Bateman and senior Erin Redd-Brandon each had four and Spurrier added three.
USC held Utah to a .125 hitting percentage in the final set as the Utes wore down. USC rolled to a 13-25 win to complete the sweep.
“I was really disappointed in set three,” Launiere said. “I mean they put pressure on us. It’s not like we chose not being able to score. Wish we could have responded a little bit better.”
Utah will regroup this week as they prepare to host Washington State on Friday followed by the No. 2 Washington Huskies on Saturday.
“We have made progress,” Spurrier said. “Now we just got to keep progressing, hold for three to five sets, and watching those little things in practice because those will grow over into the matches. ”