No. 9 BYU women's volleyball suffers rare home loss to San Diego

Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes

This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.

PROVO — In 65 of the last 67 moments immediately after a match in the post-game locker room of the BYU women’s volleyball team, the mood has been understandably upbeat.

Even in close wins, a win is something to celebrate.

Friday night’s result, though, was the exception.

Thana Fayad had 19 kills, seven digs and three blocks to help the Toreros hand No. 9 BYU its first loss in conference play, 25-18, 20-25, 25-19, 17-25, 15-10 in front of an announced crowd of 4,405 fans at the Smith Fieldhouse.

Megan Jacobsen added 13 kills and Grace Frohling supplied 12 kills and five blocks for the Toreros (15-4, 8-0 WCC).

It was the Cougars’ first home loss in WCC play since Oct. 27, 2017 — when San Diego took a 3-1 win out of Provo — and just their second home conference loss since November 2011, the year they joined the conference.

“We can’t just expect to win every game, or every home game,” said BYU outside hitter McKenna Miller, the Cougars’ leading scorer who had 13 kills and six digs for the ninth-ranked Cougars. “We have to show up and perform. This definitely showed the things we need to get better at and more consistent.”

Madelyn Robinson led the way with 18 kills for BYU (16-3, 7-1 WCC), which got 42 assists and nine digs from freshman setter Whitney Bower and another 19 digs from senior libero Mary Lake.

Whitney Bower, center, and Kennedy Eschenberg of BYU try to block a spike by Thana Fayad of San Diego during an NCAA volleyball match in Provo on Friday, Oct. 18, 2019. (Photo: Ravell Call, KSL)

But the Cougars connected on just 36 percent of their passes in the first set, and things didn’t get better from there. Then, an apparent shoulder injury to Riley Lyman in the third set hurt that passing even more in the Cougars' second home loss of the season.

Volleyball is a simple game like that.

“When we couldn’t pass, we lost those sets,” Olmstead said. “And the sets we won, I thought we passed well. The same with serving.”

San Diego opened the third set with a 10-2 blitz en route to a 2-1 lead, but BYU didn’t back down.

The Cougars used a 9-1 run, capped by a kill from freshman Kate Grimmer, to fight their way off the mat and go up 20-11 in the fourth set. Miller powered home a kill to boast set-point, 24-15, and Bower finished off the 25-17 win with a dump to send the match to a decisive fifth set.

USD led in the final set and took an 8-6 edge when the teams rotated the court. The Toreros jumped out to a 14-8 lead on Lukes’ kill, and even as the Cougars battled back to cut it close, the deficit was too much to overcome before taking their second home defeat of the season.

The Toreros won their 13th straight match Friday night, and inherit the target as the team to beat in the West Coast Conference. Unranked this week in the AVCA coaches’ poll, USD finished just five points outside the Top 25 — and has wins over St. John’s, Arkansas and USC to add to Friday night’s top-10 scalp.

The Cougars will try to bounce back with a pair of road tilts at Loyola Marymount and Pepperdine beginning next Thursday.

“I think all of us were really bummed. None of us wanted to lose this match,” Miller said. “But we’re excited to get back in the gym and to get better. We know that we have a lot to work on, and the good news is that we get to.”