Connor Bloom Award Freshman of the Week Week Of 3/27/2023 Sport Men's Volleyball School Long Beach State Year Position Hometown Huntington Beach, Calif. High School Orange Lutheran HS Connor Bloom came off the bench to aid No. 4 Long Beach State to the sweep of a home-and-home series with No. 11 USC, picking up a first Big West Freshman of the Week recognition. The redshirt freshman out of Huntington Beach and graduate of Orange Lutheran High School provided several strong serving runs for the Beach, recording an ace and a dig over three sets of action, both coming during Saturday’s 3-1 victory at USC’s Galen Center. Bloom totaled nine service attempts without an error, coming on late in the fourth and final frame Saturday to serve four straight points and get LBSU from down 19-17, to up 21-19. The Beach tallied four of the last six points from there to clinch the weekend sweep of the Trojans. Bloom is LBSU’s first Big West Freshman of the Week for 2023, after former-star-turned-professional Alex Nikolov was an eight-time recipient en route to 2022 Big West Freshman of the Year distinction.