The offensive dominance from UCLA incoming freshman Marek Turner keeps on rolling – all the way to the gold-medal match.
Turner finished with a match-high 20 kills on a .500 attack percentage as the United States swept Mexico 25-17, 25-19, 26-24 at the U21 NORCECA Pan American Cup on Friday in Canada.
The United States with this victory remains the only undefeated team at the tournament and clinches a spot in the gold-medal match on Sunday.
Turner had a combined 15 kills in the final two games against Mexico. The outside attacker capped off the performance with back-to-back kills to fight off Mexico game-points in the third game and then in overtime delivered the match-winning kill.
UCLA setter Trent Taliaferro guided the offense to out-hit Mexico .387 to .129, including the team in the second game having a match-best .576 attack percentage.
Taliaferro also had a block in the third-game overtime that set up the match-point for the United States.
Along with Turner, UC Irvine middle attacker Micah Goss contributed six kills and zero errors on a .750 attack percentage. Pin-hitter Victor Loiola had seven kills with five of those kills coming in the second game.
Mexico pin-hitter Carlos Abraham Grajeda in the loss had a team-high 10 kills.
The United States will play its pool-play finale against third-place Puerto Rico on Friday.
Puerto Rico can still surpass second-place Canada for the final spot in the gold-medal match. The team to pull off the feat, though, will need to sweep the United States, a Canada three-game loss to Mexico in that finale, and then win the point differential tiebreaker.