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Usually when a team has its best performance of the year, it is rewarded with a win.

This was not the case for the UCLA women’s volleyball team, who was defeated by USC for the 11th consecutive time on Friday.

Despite a valiant effort characterized as the team’s most productive game of the year, No. 22 UCLA was unable to break its five-year losing streak against No. 17 USC, falling 35-37, 30-26, 22-30, 30-32.

But having their best game of the year was small consolation for the Bruins, who left USC’s campus empty-handed once again.

“This sucks,” freshman Kaitlin Sather said. “My life sucks right now. I hate losing, especially to USC.”

In comparison to its loss to USC a month ago, UCLA (11-8, 4-6 Pac-10) played with more vigor and intensity through each point.

Aside from any intangible that might have impacted the rivalry, the Bruins had much better collective statistics than last month in every category.

“This performance was our best performance of the year,” UCLA coach Andy Banachowski said. “We certainly were improved since the last time we played (USC). This is the best that we’ve played on their court in number of years.

“We’re getting better, and obviously we’re not up to their level quite yet, but we’re pretty damn close.”

The Bruins came out with a vengeance in Game 1 as the team racked up a season-high 29 kills and hit .344 behind the excellent play of Sather, who hit nine kills in only 16 attempts (.500) for the game.

However, UCLA’s excellent performance was countered by superb play from the Trojans, who managed to hit at a .419 clip with 27 kills and only one error.

Freshman libero Jordan Smith led the resilient Bruin defense with 13 digs in the first game alone, but the team was unable to come out on top at the end of the first battle.

Despite rallying from a 26-29 deficit and trading side outs with the Trojans for seven straight points, the Bruins lost in USC’s longest game in the rally-scoring era, a new system of scoring which was introduced in 2001.

The slugfest continued into Game 2, as the teams matched points for the majority of the game. Tied at 20-20, the Bruins scored the next four points after a Sather ace to give them the lead for good.

“Our strong digging has a lot to do with our block because now that they know where the block is going to be, they can dig around it, and we’re doing a really good job with that,” senior middle blocker Nancy Barba said.

Barba came up huge for the Bruins, hitting at a team-high .619 clip with 14 kills in only 21 attempts.

But ultimately, UCLA was defeated by the superior play of the Trojans. USC had two players with over 20 kills, while the Bruins had none.

The Trojans also had strong defense with nine blocks and 97 total digs. The Bruins received 33 digs from Trojan libero Debora Seilhamer, who leads the nation in digs per game with 6.37.