MOBILE, Ala. ? The University of South Alabama women’s volleyball team dropped its Sun Belt Conference home opener 3-2 (25-30, 30-28, 30-25, 17-30, 11-15) Tuesday night to in-state rival Troy (7-12, 1-2 SBC) at Jag Gym.

South Alabama (5-10, 0-3 SBC) will continue Sun Belt Conference play at home when the Jags host conference newcomer Florida Atlantic on Friday night at 7 p.m. at Jag Gym.

In the opener, both clubs battled back-and-forth for the majority of the match with neither able to get more than a two point advantage.  With the score all knotted up at 24-24, the Lady Trojans pushed across six of the final seven points to secure the game one victory 30-25. 

The Jags held the early advantage in the second contest, leading by as many as five at 10-5 after a Stephanie Cutter kill.  Troy continued to battle and eventually cut the South Alabama lead to 17-16 after a setting error by USA.  The Jags captured the next three points however and stretched its lead back out to three.  The USA advantage stayed at around the three point area for much of the rest of the way until the Trojans again trimmed the South Alabama lead to 29-28.  USA evened up the match on the very next point as Troy gave the Lady Jags the 30-28 win after a ball handling error.

With the match all square at one game apiece, South Alabama came out in game three and quickly jumped out to an 8-3 advantage, including a 4-0 run to start the game.  The Jag spurt was highlighted by three service aces, two coming from Cutter and one from Summer Pilgrim.  USA later held its biggest lead of the game at 14-6 after a Trojan attack error.  Troy fought back and took the next five points to cut the Jaguar lead to three points, but that was as close as South Alabama would let the visitors get, as USA eventually stretched its lead back out to seven at 18-11 and went on to take the 30-25 victory.

The fourth game was at tight contest until with the Jags holding a 12-11 lead; Troy reeled off nine unanswered points to claim a 21-12 advantage.  The Trojan run was led by three Aubre Smith kills.  USA was unable to respond to the Trojan run and Troy evened up the match with the 30-17 victory.  The key stat of the game was in the attack percentage column where the Trojans hit a blistering .406.

Defense highlighted the fifth and deciding game early on.  After Troy took the opening point, USA captured the next three courtesy of its front line defense.  Pilgrim and Kalyn Hundley combined for three straight block assist.  On the third, Lauren Robbins was credited with a block assist of her own to go along with the duo of Pilgrim and Hundley.  After a kill from Liz Leeds (Troy), the next three points saw the Trojan defense combine for three straight block assist of its own, the first two coming from Smith and Meghan Gilroy and then Gilroy combining with Leeds.  With the score knotted up at 5-5, Troy took the lead for good after another Leeds kill ignited a 4-1 spurt.  South Alabama was able to trim the deficit to two on two occasions the rest of the way but could get no closer as Troy took the game and the match with the 15-11 win.

USA was led offensively on the night by Robbins and Taylor Irvin who finished with 12 and 10 kills, respectively.  Smith led four Lady Trojans in double figures with a match-high 21 kills of her own.  Defensively, Pilgrim and Hundley finished with nine and eight block assists, respectively, for South Alabama.