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April 13, 2002
LOS ANGELES -- All-American senior Brook Billings had a season-high 36 kills to help the USC men's volleyball team snap its school-record 11-match losing streak with a 30-27, 35-37, 30-28, 30-25 win over No. 14 Pacific in a Mountain Pacific Sports Federation contest on Saturday (April 13) in the USC North Gym.
The Trojans, who finished their season with a 6-22 overall mark and 3-19 in the MPSF, denied Pacific the final spot in the upcoming 8-team MPSF tournament (Cal State Northridge gets the final berth). The Tigers concluded their season at 10-18 overall and 8-14 in the MPSF.
Billings, who ended his USC career as one of only a few Trojans to ever record 2,000 kills (he posted 2,075), hit .464 in the match and added 7 digs, 2 blocks and 2 aces. Phil Small had 11 kills (hitting .500) and 4 blocks, Blake Tippett had 8 kills and 7 digs and Beau Rawi-another senior playing his last USC match-had 7 kills (hitting .316), 7 digs and 2 aces. Miles McGann had 12 digs.
Pacific had 4 players in double kill figures: Sean Rodgers had 20 (hitting .421) with 3 blocks, Dan Hoefer had 16 (hitting .368), Aaron Wachtfogel had 13 with a match-best 14 digs and Martin Berntsen had 10 (hitting .368) with 12 digs. Tim Gerlach added 9 kills while hitting .500 and had 4 blocks. Hoefer, Wachtfogel and Gerlach are seniors who played the final match of their careers.
Both teams hit .338 for the match. USC had 9.5 team blocks to Pacific's 9.0 and the Trojans had more aces (8 to 5).
After the first game was tied at 16-16, a Pacific serving error and a Billings kill gave USC a lead it never relinquished. In the second game, USC battled back from a 25-22 deficit to tie it at 26-26 and the teams then traded points until a Rodgers kill and a Trojan hitting error ended that game. Pacific scored 7 consecutive points early in the third game to take a 12-5 lead, but USC fought back to knot it at 25-25, soon after, a Billings kill, a Tiger hitting error and a kill by Jeff Bailey gave Troy a 3-point cushion. The fourth game saw USC go up 5-1 and then Pacific take a 14-11 lead before the Trojans opened up a 19-16 margin and held on.
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The win also ended USC's 11-match MPSF losing streak and its 7-match home losing skid, both school records. Troy's 22 losses in 2002 are a school record.
