From the time she was born, USC freshman outside hitter London Wijay has been a competitor. Her ambitious nature is driven by the fact that growing up, everything she did with her family was some sort of challenge.
“My family is super athletic. They all went to college for a sport, D1 at the University of Houston,” Wijay said. “We always had competitions, it just made our family closer, and I’m a super competitive person because of it.”
Following the lead of her parents — who both played sports at the University of Houston — Wijay naturally pursued an athletic path from a young age. Despite playing basketball, soccer, field hockey, tennis and pickleball, Wijay gravitated toward her true love for volleyball at the age of four. Her mother, Morgan, the founder of Supernova All-Stars Volleyball Club, was Wijay’s coach throughout a lot of her career. She also credits Mike Lingenfelter, the owner and co-director of Munciana Volleyball Club, where Wijay played club during her final year of high school, as another major influence on her volleyball career.
Wijay led a stellar high school career that included back-to-back CIF championships and the 18U national championship with MVC under Lingenfelter. She said that she was never really into a lot of the social aspects of high school like prom or homecoming, especially since she was in high school during the COVID-19 pandemic. Her early success paved a path to an early graduation, which allowed her to reclassify and join the USC women’s volleyball team in time for the 2023 season. Despite her family’s ties to Houston, Wijay always had her heart set on USC.
“What made me choose USC was just the atmosphere, the swag, the determination that [head coach] Brad [Keller] has, the determination that everybody on the court has,” Wijay said. “[Senior outside hitter] Skyler [Fields] was one of them, the decisions why I chose to be here cause I wanted to learn a lot from her. I was close to my family, which was great, and it’s been my dream school since I was younger, and just have always felt like USC has always been the place for me.”
Keller had coached Wijay earlier in her career when she was 13 while working at Supernova, and as a result, knows Wijay and her family extremely well. This allowed him to really understand the depth and knowledge that she possesses for the game.
“When you’re around it so much, it becomes kind of a second language to you, which is why I think a lot of people are so excited about her because she plays the game at a different level,” Keller said. “She does a lot of things that a lot of other players aren’t doing and she’s doing it at a young age.”
Keller offered her the opportunity to join USC and forgo her senior year of high school, but he said he would not have pressured her into it if Wijay was not ready for it.
“I think she brings a lot of different elements. She passes, she plays defense, she’s just a complete volleyball player. I think this team needs that,” Keller said. “She’s more balanced as a player. So I think that opens up some of the other players, and I think she brings a lot of value with that.”
Sophomore libero Megan Verbiest knew Wijay before their USC careers from playing in beach volleyball tournaments when they were kids.
“She wanted really good teammates and a coaching staff, and I think that’s everything we had to offer,” Verbiest said. “We’re all like family, the team culture is amazing, and I think that’s the best thing you can do when you’re so young coming into such an intense program.”
Wijay also talked about how she clicked with Verbiest when she visited USC on her recruiting trip, as well as everyone else on the team. Upon meeting everyone on the team for the first time, Wijay realized that she enjoyed not only being with Verbiest, but also all of her other future teammates.
“She fits in so perfectly, she’s so young too,” Verbiest said. “But she’s just like all of us. She’s such a sweet girl, and has such an amazing heart, and really wants to win, wants the best for everyone, and it’s great energy and presence on the court.”
The veteran players are not only showing Wijay the ropes, but also mentoring many of the other younger players, which has had a positive effect on the team culture.
“I think a lot of our upperclassmen are doing a good job of leading and guiding not only her, but a lot of the players on this team,” Keller said. “I think it’s a long journey to get culture right, and I think we’re well on our way and doing the right things with that.”
Wijay’s favorite volleyball moment was when the Trojans took on the Purdue Boilermakers in West Lafayette and upset them three sets to one. The atmosphere and energy in the arena during the match was unforgettable. In addition, she also enjoyed getting to face crosstown rival UCLA, where USC took down the Bruins in an exciting five-set thriller.
“She was just a force to be reckoned with and couldn’t be stopped, and really helped us win those big matches,” Verbiest said.
Off the court, Wijay said that her favorite moment as a Trojan was her first football game she attended as a student, when USC hosted recruits on the field before the football team crushed Stanford 56-10 on September 9. When she isn’t playing volleyball, she said that she enjoys getting boba, going on random drives, shopping and hanging out with her friends.
Verbiest can personally attest that Wijay likes to hang out with friends, and recalls all the times that Wijay has paid her a visit.
“She’ll always call me randomly all the time and say: ‘Okay, I’m coming over,’” Verbiest said. “And I’m like: ‘Okay, let me give you the codes to come in and we’ll just sit down and hang out.’”
Coming into USC at 17 years old — and a year earlier than most college students — certainly has presented challenges for Wijay, challenges that she is working her way through and adjusting as she figures out life on her own.
“Biggest challenge was definitely just learning how to fight for my own food, learning how to get on the starting side, learning what I can do to make the team better, learning different personalities, how to manage them, how to get along with them, communicating, being organized, not losing my things,” Wijay said. “Learning how to just be a grown-up, mature and not 17, was probably the stuff I needed to learn.”
Wijay is currently majoring in real estate development, as she said she has always found houses and real estate very fascinating, and hopes to open her real estate brokerage company and do home development in the future. USC’s real estate development major made playing for the Trojans even more appealing than it already was for Wijay.
“I’ve literally been obsessed with real estate since I was a child,” Wijay said. “Everybody thinks it’s so weird, but when I was younger, I was in seventh grade, and my parents are like: ‘What do you want to do for your birthday?’ And I was like: ‘I wanna look at open houses.’”
Wijay also hopes to play volleyball overseas for a couple of years with hopes of making the US National team. But for right now, she has her eyes set on helping USC bring home a national championship.
“To win a national championship, and I know our record of winning and losing comes close, but our team, when we’re on, we’re on and I think it’s really hard to beat our team,” Wijay said. “Like to beat Washington State, the number four team [on October 20], when we weren’t even doing the best, that wasn’t even our best. So when we’re at our best, it’s gonna be really hard for someone to beat us, in my opinion.”
Wijay and the Trojans have a chance to go for it all when they head to Pittsburgh to take on the UMBC Retrievers in the first round of the NCAA Tournament on Friday afternoon.
Keller knows that her good work ethic will take her far in life, even after Wijay graduates and moves into the next chapter of her life.
“She’s such a great human,” Keller said. “I think that she is just an incredible person, and when you’re an incredible person, and you’re talented and you have a good work ethic, good things are gonna happen down the road.”