COLUMBIA, S.C. — After being swept for the first time this season, the LSU volleyball team will look to rebound against South Carolina on Sunday at 12:30 p.m. CDT in the Volleyball Competition Facility.
The Tigers enter the contest at 18-5 on the season and 9-4 in Southeastern Conference play after falling to No. 10 Florida on the road on Friday. The Gamecocks are 10-12 on the year and 3-10 in league play and have lost five of their last six matches, falling to Ole Miss in four games on Friday.
“It’s important that we get back on track,” said LSU head coach Fran Flory. ?Playing on the road in the SEC is always a challenge regardless of anyone’s record it’s very competitive top to bottom. “We’re going to have to regroup and challenge ourselves to step up against a South Carolina team that is much improved and really challenged Ole Miss on Friday.”
In front of the largest crowd in LSU volleyball history, the Tigers swept South Carolina, 30-19, 30-27, 30-19, in their first meeting this year on Sept. 21 in the Maravich Center. LSU is now second in the SEC Western Division after the loss to Florida and sits one game behind Alabama with seven matches remaining.
“We know we’re going to be in a fight. I think if we focus on our side of the net and taking care of the ball and can get back into our offensive rhythm. That is the challenge for us to be successful as a team.”
Sophomore Lauren DeGirolamo led that match with 15 kills for the Tigers, while posting a .542 hitting percentage. Brittnee Cooper posted 11 while hitting at a .421 clip and Marina Skender had 10. Cooper also tied for the match lead with four blocks, while Angela Bensend had three.
Junior Elena Martinez led LSU with 14 digs, followed by Maggie Lonergan with 13 and Skender with 12. In addition, Lonergan finished with 42 assists as both she and Skender posted double-doubles.
As a team, the Tigers dominated the Gamecocks statistically. LSU posted 53 kills to only 36 for South Carolina, with no Gamecock reaching double figures in kills. The Tigers also hit at a .301 clip, while holding South Carolina to a .103 percentage, including three Gamecocks in negative figures. LSU held a slight advantage in blocks with 6.5 to 6.0, and topped South Carolina with 57 digs to 50.
For the season, the Tigers and Gamecocks are similar in most statistical categories. South Carolina holds a slight statistical advantage offensively with 15.5 kills per game and a .225 hitting percentage, compared with a 15.4 kills per game average and .216 hitting percentage for LSU. The Tigers hold a slight advantage in digs per game, posting 17.0 per game, while the Gamecocks are posting 16.9 per game, and LSU holds a significant advantage in blocking. The Tigers average 3.0 blocks per game, while South Carolina is at 2.3 per game.
Earlier this week, junior Kyna Washington became only the 14th player in LSU history to record 1,000 career kills. She is also just the fifth junior to accomplish the feat. She currently leads the team and ranks third in the SEC with 4.12 kills per game. Washington also leads the team and ranks third in the SEC with a 0.54 service ace per game average. Skender ranks fifth in the league with 0.48 aces per game and is now 49 kills away from also recording her 1,000th career kill.
The Tigers are led by a pair of sophomore middle blockers who rank in the top six in the SEC in blocking. Cooper leads LSU and ranks second in the conference with 1.53 blocks per game, while DeGirolamo is sixth in the league with 1.32 blocks per game. DeGirolamo 3.39 kills per game and Cooper is third at 2.81 kills per game.
Against Notre Dame on Tuesday, Cooper recorded a career high 21 kills, topping her previous high by three, while hitting .613 , another career high, which was just shy of a top 10 performance in school history. With 13 blocks, she again broke her career best and tied for the seventh most total blocks in a five-game match in LSU history. Of those 13 blocks, 11 were assists, which tied for the eighth most in a five-game match.
Martinez leads the SEC with an amazing 5.59 digs per game. Against Florida, she became just the third LSU player to record over 500 digs in a single season. She is now just 32 digs away from breaking Kassi Mikulik‘s single-season record of 535 digs set last season. In addition, she has broken the single-match records for digs in a four-game and five-game match.
The Gamecocks are led by Ivana Kujundzic with 3.46 kills per game, one of six players averaging over two kills a game. Belitia Salters is recording 2.75 kills per game with a team-best .338 attacking percentage. Salters also leads South Carolina with 1.13 blocks per game. Both Dinelia Concepcion and Sarah Cline are averaging over three digs a game at 3.54 and 3.19 respectively.
With the win over South Carolina earlier in the season, the Tigers finally took over the series lead all-time, 12-11. After three meetings in the 70s and 80s, the pair began yearly play in 1991 when the Gamecocks joined the SEC. From 1991-95, the Tigers won five of the seven meetings. Beginning with the second meeting of the 1995 season, South Carolina won nine straight meetings before LSU knocked off the Gamecocks in the second meeting of 2003. Since that point, the Tigers have six straight over South Carolina, their longest winning streak over the Gamecocks in school history.
LSU returns home next weekend as the Tigers try to avenge two of their three conference losses. Having lost to both Kentucky and Tennessee in five games on the road, LSU will try to get those matches back as the Tigers face the Wildcats on Friday at 7 p.m. and the Lady Vols on Sunday at 1:30 p.m. The match against Kentucky is the second Student-Point Match of the season as students push for their final chances to earn points for priority football tickets.