Beach Volleyball . February 28, 2025

Gamecocks Play Two in Saturday's Home Opener

COLUMBIA, S.C. – South Carolina beach volleyball hosts its home opener on Saturday, March 1, welcoming in Austin Peay (1-3) and UAB (3-2) for the Wheeler Beach Bash tournament. The Gamecocks (2-1) will play Austin Peay at 10 a.m. on Wheeler Beach and wrap up the day against the Blazers at 2 p.m.

This spring, attendance at home matches at Wheeler Beach is again free and open to the general public. Please continue to follow the athletics department’s clear bag policy. Fan entrance is only permitted on the north side of the facility through the main gate and only participating teams and game-day personnel are permitted on the sand surface. Please refer to the athletics village parking guide site (updated weekly) for up-to-date information heading into Saturday.

WEEK ONE NOTABLES

Saturday’s opening day marked the first time at the top of the lineup for both Jolie Cranford and Morgan Downs. Previously, Cranford’s highest position was four starts at number two, Downs had made 19 of her 29 career starts on court four, her highest position entering the season. The duo won in three sets over UNCW for their first win together in the top spot.
Sophomore Lauren Lawson went 2-0 with partner VB Trost on court five, they are the first two wins of Lawson’s collegiate career. The Georgia native spent her freshman season at Grand Canyon and did not appear in any matches.
Fellow transfer Jordan Benoit (Pepperdine, 2021-23) also picked up her first win as a Gamecock. She and partner Evie Ziffer won in straight sets over UNCW, earning the clinching point in the team’s dual win.
The Gamecocks went to three sets in 10 of the 20 total matches played in four duals. They would lock up eight of those 10 matches.

SCOUTING THE WEEKEND FIELD
AUSTIN PEAY

This is the first meeting between the two programs.
The Governors compete in the ASUN conference and are under first-year head coach Michael Hobson. In his last stop, Hobson led Louisiana-Monroe to a 31-4 record in 2024.
In their opening weekend, the Govs dropped all three duals at the Grand Sands tournament up in Cincinnati.

UAB

South Carolina leads the series, 16-1 (since 2014).
The Gamecocks won the most recent meeting, 3-2, on March 15, 2024.
Three of the last five meetings have been decided by a 3-2 score. The Blazers’ only win in the series came on Wheeler Beach back on March 25, 2018. South Carolina is on a nine-game win streak over UAB.
In the opening weekend, the Blazers went 3-2 at the Green Wave Invitational, picking up wins over New Orleans, Southeastern Louisiana and host Tulane. UAB’s top pairing of Jazzy Haas and Olivia Stant went 4-1 on the top court.

CHASING 200
Entering the 12th season as a program, South Carolina is in striking distance from an important milestone this spring. The Gamecocks hold an all-time record of 195-123 since their start in 2014. Head coach Moritz Moritz, the leader of the team since its inception, currently ranks 11th in the NCAA record books for career wins, but because the sport was not recognized as a NCAA sport until 2016, Moritz’s career record stands at 175-104.

TURNOVER IN THE LINEUP
The team lost six players who recorded at least one win in the lineup in 2024 and four from its starting lineup from the 2024 CCSA conference tournament, most notably 20-game winners Skylar Allen and Hannah Mackenhausen, Allison Coens (10 wins at No. 1) and Sophie Bengoechea (12 wins at No. 5). The team does return 20-game winners in Jolie Cranford and Riley Whitesides, CCSA Freshman of the Year Julia Waugh (17-8 record) and three more Gamecocks who cracked the double-digit win mark in 2024 (Morgan Downs; 17 wins, Peyton Yamagata; 16 wins, VB Trost; 13 wins).

There is a sizable gap on the roster when it comes to experience; with the departure of Allen (140 career starts), Mackenhausen (130) and Coens (108), Cranford’s 65 starts leads the 2025 team. Out of the 20 women on the roster this spring, 13 have started in 30 or fewer matches at the collegiate level.

A NEW HOME, A NEW OPPORTUNITY
With the limited collegiate experience returning to the squad in 2025, the Gamecock staff turned to transfers to round out the roster. Joining the team for the 2025 campaign are Jordan Benoit and Juju Quintero from Pepperdine, Reagan Elizondo and Lauren Lawson from Grand Canyon, and Rachel Hartmann from Southeastern Louisiana.

Benoit made 35 starts over three years at Pepperdine, Quintero made 24 starts over two years and the duo teamed up for a number of key wins for the Waves. Elizondo and Lawson were freshmen teammates at GCU in 2024, but neither saw time in the lineup.

Hartmann has had one of the most unique paths to Carolina, starting as an indoor and beach athlete at William Carey, a NAIA school, for three years. She transferred to Southeastern Louisiana to play indoor and beach again in 2023-24. With the Lions, she was named Southland Conference Newcomer of the Year and first team all-conference, helping the indoor team win the conference tournament title and make the 2023 NCAA tournament. On the beach with SLU, she went 20-5 in the No. 1 position, setting the program’s single-season record for most wins. Ironically, one of her wins came against South Carolina’s pairing of Riley Whitesides and Hannah Mackenhausen, on March 16, 2024.

ALL-TIME RECORDS

South Carolina holds a 195-123 all-time program record, dating back to 2014.
The Gamecocks joined the CCSA for volleyball in 2016, and have an all-time conference record of 46-40 (.541).
In matches at Wheeler Beach, Carolina is 89-30 (.748), including a 19-9 record against CCSA conference opponents.
Moritz Moritz is in his 12th season as head coach of the Gamecocks, spanning the entire young history of the program. He earned his 175th career win vs. Coastal Carolina on March 2, 2024.
South Carolina has two postseason tournament appearances, making the NCAA eight-team field in 2017 and 2018.
The Gamecocks have two all-americans in program history: Katie Smith (2021) and Skylar Allen (2021 and 2023).