Volleyball Today: Michigan St. reverse sweeps at USC, Pitt faces Louisville

The 2024 season of upsets and reverse sweeps continued Thursday when Michigan State did both.

The Spartans, winless in the Big Ten, pulled off a reverse sweep at USC, the No. 14 team in the VolleyballMag Super 16 Media Poll.

It was a good night for the visiting teams as the other four ranked teams in action won: No. 3 Penn State in five at UCLA, No. 8 Wisconsin at Indiana, No. 13 Arizona State at Arizona and No. 21 Utah at Kansas State.

Friday’s schedule, highlighted below, has a battle extraordinaire in the ACC when No. 1 Pittsburgh (17-1, 7-1) plays host to No. 4 Louisville (16-2, 8-0). The last time they played, in the 2023 NCAA regional final, Pittsburgh won in a reverse sweep to get to the national semifinals. They split their regular-season matches, with Louisville sweeping at home and then Pitt winning another reverse sweep in the rematch at home.

There were, of course, other reverse sweeps as Arkansas State did it to Troy in the Sun Belt and Utah Valley did it at Grand Canyon in the WAC.

Lines of the night: They happened in defeat. 

In Fresno State’s Mountain West win over visiting Nevada, Nevada’s Gabby McLaughlin had 31 kills, hit .328, and had three aces and 10 digs. 

Sam Houston won its Conference USA match at Jacksonville State, but JSU’s Kayla Williams had 30 kills, an ace, seven digs and three blocks.

And Grand Canyon’s Tatum Parrott, in that aforementioned reverse-sweep defeat, had 29 kills, hit .309, and had an ace, 23 digs and three blocks, one solo.

Athletes Unlimited starts the fourth round of its five-week season in Mesa, Arizona, with two matches. At 7 p.m. Eastern, Team (Morgan) Hentz plays Team (Bethania) De La Cruz-Mejia in a match that can be seen on the FanDuel Sports Network and Volleyball World TV. At 9:30 p.m., Team (Brittany) Abercrombie plays Team (Leketor) Member-Meneh. It can be seen on ESPN+. Click here for more.

We also have some coaching news in this edition of Volleyball Today:

NCAA volleyball Friday

The ACC takes center stage with the aforementioned Louisville-at-Pitt battle. Sadly, that match won’t be on a linear network and can only be streamed on ACCNX.

Sixth-ranked Stanford is home for Cal, No. 11 SMU is home for Notre Dame, No. 17 Georgia Tech is home for NC State, No. 19 Florida State is at North Carolina, Virginia Tech is at Boston College, Wake Forest is at Clemson and Miami is at Duke.

TCU, No. 16 in the VBM Poll and No. 18 in the AVCA’s, goes to No. 23 Baylor in the Big 12, where No. 21 BYU is at Colorado and Houston goes to UCF.

The four matches in the Big Ten show No. 2 Nebraska home for Illinois, No. 12 Oregon home for Maryland, Rutgers at Washington and Michigan at Iowa.

The SEC has No. 24 Florida home for Tennessee, LSU at Auburn and Missouri at Arkansas.

Fifth-ranked Creighton has a Big East at Georgetown, while Marquette is at Seton Hall.

Dayton of the Atlantic 10, ranked No. 20 and riding a 12-match winning streak, goes to Fordham.

The two Conference USA leaders, both 10-0, go at it at UTEP when Western Kentucky visits.

There’s a key match in the ASUN when first-place FGCU goes to Lipscomb, tied with Central Arkansas a game back in the standings. Both teams have won 13 in a row.

Buffalo, which holds a one-game lead in the win column in the MAC over Central Michigan and Bowling Green, goes to CMU.

The key match in the SoCon pits the two second-place teams, both a game back in the loss column behind Mercer, when Wofford goes to Samford.

Winless watch: 0-23 Hampton is home for Campbell in the CAA. The Fighting Camels, down 5-0 in the fifth, kept Hampton winless as they won their Thursday-night match in a wild five, 23-25, 25-18, 25-14, 29-31, 17-15. Hampton, 0-11 in the CAA, was so close, with match points at 14-13 and 15-14. Madison Clark had a match-high 24 kills for Hampton to go with four blocks and four digs.

NCAA volleyball Thursday 

Michigan State (8-12, 1-8), which had lost nine in a row, battled to a 20-25, 22-25, 27-25, 25-20, 15-13 Big Ten victory at USC (14-5, 6-3). Akasha Anderson not only led the Spartans with 26 kills, but added an assist, two aces, 13 digs and five blocks. Taylor Preston had 12 kills, three digs and two blocks. Julia Bishop had two kills, 46 assists, an ace, 12 digs and a block. Her team hit .225.

USC, which hit .262 and held a 15-10 blocks advantage, got 23 kills from Ally Batenhorst, who hit .357 and had four assists, seven digs and five blocks, one solo. Adonia Faumuina, who had six blocks, and Jadyn Livings had 14 kills each. Livings had three aces, two blocks and 11 digs. Mia Tuaniga had five kills in six errorless tries, an ace, three blocks and nine digs …

Also in the B1G, Penn State (19-1, 9-0) won its 11th in a row, 25-21, 19-25, 25-15, 19-25, 15-9 at UCLA (9-9, 3-6). Jess Mruzik led with 16 kills, two assists, 10 digs and two blocks, one solo. Camryn Hannah had 15 kills, a dig and a block, and Taylor Trammel had 11 kills with one error in 20 attacks, a dig and three blocks, one solo. Maggie Mendelson had seven kills, five digs, two assists, an ace and eight blocks, one solo. Setter Izzy Starck had six kills, 45 assists, 14 digs and four blocks. UCLA’s Grayce Olson had 20 kills, nine digs and three blocks, and Cheridyn Leverette had 19 kills, four digs and a block. Audrey Pak had two kills, 55 assists, seven digs and five blocks … Wisconsin (14-4,8-1) swept at Indiana (9-10, 2-7) as the Badgers hit .369 and coach Kelly Sheffield got his 306th Wisconsin victory, surpassing Pete Waite. Sarah Franklin had 15 kills, hit .314, and had two assists, five digs and four blocks, one solo …

In the Big 12, Arizona State (20-2, 8-1) won 25-23, 15-25, 25-19, 15-15 at Arizona (13-6, 2-6). Geli Cyr led with 14 kills, two assists, two aces, 11 digs and a block. Claire Jeter had eight kills with one error in 14 attacks, three digs and six blocks, one solo. Argentina Ung had eight kills, 38 assists, three aces, 13 digs and two blocks. Arizona’s Jaelyn Hodge had 17 kills and Jordan Wilson 15 to go with 14 digs and four blocks, one solo … Utah (16-3, 6-2) won in four at Kansas State (6-11, 4-4) despite 27 kills by K-State’s Aliyah Carter. She hit .362 and had an assist, 11 digs and a blocks. Utah’s Kamryn Gibadlo and Emrie Satuala had 12 kills each. Gibadlo hit 379 and had six digs and a block and Satuala hit .476 and had an assist, two aces and two blocks … Texas Tech (10-10, 2-6) won in five at Cincinnati (11-8, 2-6) …

All four Southland Conference matches were sweeps, including first-place Southeastern Louisana winning at Houston Christian. The Lions won their 18th match in a row … UT Arlington rolled on, too, as the WAC-leading Mavs swept at Seattle U in the WAC for their 10th in a row …

UC Davis maintained its one-game lead in the Big West when the Aggies won in four at UC Irvine and Olivia Utterback had 20 kills, hit .500, and had two assists, an ace, 10 digs and three blocks … Cal Poly stayed a game back with a five-set win at Long Beach State. Breklyn Pulling had 14 kills with one error in 28 attacks to hit .464 and had four blocks. Elif Hurriyet had 28 digs, three assists and three aces … Also in the Big West, Sydney Dunning had 23 kills and hit .457 in CSU Bakersfield’s four-set win at CSUN. Dunning also had an assist, an ace and 13 digs … UC Santa Barbara won in four at UC San Diego and Eva Travis had 22 kills, hitting .372, to go with an ace, five digs and four blocks, one solo … Cleveland State won its Horizon League match in five at Robert Morris as Liberty Torres had 21 kills and Nia Hall had 20 … 

Colorado State and Fresno State remained tied atop the Mountain West standings. CSU won in four at New Mexico while Fresno State rallied for a 28-30, 25-15, 19-25, 29-27, 15-12 victory over visiting Nevada… Also in the MWC, Paige Bartsch had 23 kills for Boise State in a five-set win over visiting San Diego State … 

LMU and Pepperdine both won to stayed tied atop the WCC. LMU swept at Portland, while Pepperdine won in five at San Francisco behind 20 kills from Grace Chillingworth, who hit .388 and had 12 digs and three blocks, one solo. Birdie Hendrickson had 18 kills, an assist, four aces, 16 digs and four blocks. USF’s Maria Petkova had 19 kills, hit .314, and had nine digs and three blocks, one solo … San Diego stayed a game back with a sweep at Pacific …

The two top teams in the Ohio Valley Conference won. Lindenwood, which holds a two-game lead in the win column, swept visiting Tennessee State, while Southeast Missouri did the same to Eastern Illinois …

Rhode Island beat visiting Saint Louis in the A10 and Megan Disu had 14 kills with one error in 24 attacks to hit .542 and had three blocks, one solo … Weber State won its Big Sky match with Sacramento State in five and Saane Munyer had six kills with one error in 10 swings and six blocks, one solo. Sacramento State’s Bridgette Smith had 22 kills, an ace and 11 digs … Also in the Big Sky, Northern Arizona swept at Idaho and Taylor Jacobsen had 18 kills with one error in 40 attacks, five digs and a block … In Middle Tennessee’s four-set Conference USA win over Louisiana Tech, Ariana Rhoda had 21 kills, hitting .372, to go with six digs and three blocks … Wofford got 13 kills each from Mary Emily Morgan and Sarah MacLean in its SoCon sweep of Chattanooga … Omaha swept at North Dakota to pull even in the win column with idle South Dakota State in The Summit League standings … South Alabama, which leads the Sun Belt, got 16 kills each from Abryanna Cannon and Maradith O’Gorman in a sweep of visiting Louisiana. O’Gorman hit .542 and had five blocks, three solo … In Utah Valley’s five-set win at GCU, Avery Shewell had 24 kills, hit .317, and had four aces, 17 digs and two blocks … Also in the WAC, Utah Tech swept at Abilene Christian and Kennedi Knudsen had 20 kills, hitting .400, to go with eight digs and four blocks … Nicole Mauser had 17 kills and hit .484 and Eliana Posado had 17 kills and eight blocks — three solo — as California Baptist broke its seven-match losing streak with a four-set win over visiting Southern Utah.

Coaching carousel

Radford, which is in the middle of its season, has hired Savanna Hammond as head coach. The Highlanders of Virginia — 7-10 overall, 4-2 in the Big South — have been without head coach Chris Hertel since October 1 when he left “due to personal reasons effective immediately.”

Michelle Johnson has been the interim head coach. Hammond has been the head coach the past years at Division II Bluefield State. She played at Radford. Bluefield State of West Virginia is 10-14, 6-1 in the CIAA. Scott Walsh is listed as the interim head coach … 

Central Arkansas has hired Avery Thibodeax as its beach coach. He was at the University of New Orleans, where he the interim head beach volleyball coach since August 2021.

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