PROVO, Utah — No. 10 BYU men's volleyball will host No. 4 USC Friday and Saturday nights at the Smith Fieldhouse, with important MPSF standings implications on the line late in the regular season.
Its Crunch Time for the Cougars
This weekend’s matches will be the final of the regular season at home for BYU. The Cougars hit the road next weekend to face No. 1 UCLA and then its the MPSF Tournament, which this season will be hosted at BYU in the Smith Fieldhouse. The Cougars are currently in fourth place in the MPSF, tied with Stanford. Two wins this weekend would tie BYU with USC for third place.
Senior Night
Saturday night the Cougars will honor four seniors playing in their final regular-season matches in the Smith Fieldhouse: Jackson Fife, Cole Hauser, Tyler Herget and Trent Moser.
Hitting 206 Wins for Olmstead
In his 11th season with the BYU men’s volleyball program, head coach Shawn Olmstead recently hit the 200-win plateau, and now he has passed Carl McGown for the program’s most wins for a head coach with 206. McGown reached those victories in 336 matches. Olmstead is currently at 290 total matches.
Still Top-10
After starting of the season at No. 8 in the AVCA poll for the first five weeks of the season, the Cougars moved up a spot to No. 7 for a few weeks. A few road losses pushed the Cougars back, and while some losses dropped the Cougars back to No. 10, they have not fell out of the top 10 this season.
En-Trent-ched Offense
Senior outside hitter Trent Moser continues to lead the Cougars offensively this season with 3.18 kills per set on a .324 hitting percentage. Moser had a career-high 22 kills in BYU’s five-set loss to Stanford this season.
Un-Herget-able Passing
Senior setter Tyler Herget is averaging 10.07 assists per set. That mark is second-best in the MPSF and seventh-best in the nation. Herget is currently No. 6 in all-time assists at BYU with 2550 in his career. He needs 240 more to reach Rob Neilson who is No. 5 at 2790. Herget would need to average 34 assists per match in seven more matches or 40 assists per match in six more matches to reach No. 5.
Block Stars
BYU is currently 11th in the NCAA in blocks per set at 2.376. AJ Cottle is the Cougars’ individual leader with 1.015 blocks per set. His blocks per set are 22nd-best individually in the NCAA.
Getting to Know USC
The Trojans enter the weekend red hot on an eight-match win streak and have a 16-3 overall record. While USC is 13-2 at home, the Trojans are 3-1 on the raod, playing just four road matchs this season so far. USC has no road matches on its schedule this season outside of the state of California, except for these road matches in Provo. Senior outside hitter Dillon Klein ranks second in both the nation and the MPSF for kills (4.20 kps) and points (4.97 pps). He has reached double-digit kills in 16 of 17 matches and has had six contests with 20 or more kills. Redshirt sophomore middle blocker Wesley Smith leads the MPSF in blocks (1.18 bps) which ranks fifth in the NCAA.
Series Snapshot
BYU leads the all-time series 51-29, but USC has won the past four meetings.
Broadcast Details
Both matches this weekend will stream live on Big Ten Plus. The matches will also be available to watch on-demand for free after 10 p.m. Mountain Time on BYUtv.org and the BYUtv App. Additionally, Saturday’s match will be broadcast nationally on the Big Ten Network.