A two-week break to heal the bodily aches and pains. A two-match series with San Diego State to heal the wounded egos.
The University of Hawaii men's volleyball team repaired its bruised league image with a sweep of the winless Aztecs.
Saturday night's 71-minute Mountain Pacific Sports Federation victory included a rarity in men's collegiate volleyball: a 15-0 battering that constituted Game 1.
The late-night crowd of 7,350 at the Special Events Arena took longer to find parking spaces than the Rainbows took to jump-start their 15-0, 15-8, 15-13 win with a high-voltage charge.
Hawaii needed 10 minutes, six kills and five aces in Game 1 en route to victory and improving to 7-4 overall and moving within a half-game of Pacific Division leader Stanford at 5-3.
"A lot of people are counting us out right now," said Rainbow junior blocker Rick Tune. "No one is thinking about us so this is a chance to sneak up on people. We win the rest of our matches and we finish in first place.
"We had some injuries but I think everyone's focused and ready to play now."
With the parity in the MPSF this season - only two games separate first from fifth in the Pacific Division - the Rainbows may not have to win all of their 13 MPSF matches to successfully defend their division title. But it couldn't hurt to sweep this week's tough road trip, one that has defending national champion UCLA sandwiched between Long Beach State and UC Irvine in a four-day span.
"This road trip could make or break the season for us," said UH senior setter Curt Vaughan, who is looking forward to playing the 49ers Wednesday, Bruins Friday and Anteaters Saturday.
"A sweep is within our reach as long as we go into the road trip with a positive outlook. We may be 7-4 but we know we're a much better team than that. We'll be playing good teams but we're hitting on all cylinders right now.
"These wins (over San Diego State) were good for us. We needed to get out on the court and work on some things and not have to worry about losing a game."
San Diego State (0-9, 0-11) was more concerned about scoring a point. The Aztecs gave up 18 consecutive points - 15-0 Game 1 and 3-0 Game 2 - before getting on the scoreboard on a Naveh Milo hitting error.
In fact, of San Diego State's eight points in Game 2, six came on Hawaii mistakes, two on aces. Matt Galvin and five aces were the main reasons the Aztecs hung around in Game 3, poised to take a game off an opponent for the first time in 11 matches.
Against a Hawaii lineup that included four reserves, SDSU closed to 14-13. Galvin, a former Navy diver who began his playing career at BYU, zinged in two of his five aces for a one-point deficit before netting his fourth serve.
Three sideouts later, Milo and Jason Ring stuffed Tom Hunter to end it. The Rainbows finished with a 10-1 advantage in blocks, 12-7 in aces and .383-.124 in hitting.
Ring and Milo led Hawaii with nine kills each. Sivan Leoni, moving from middle to opposite, had four aces and four blocks.
"This was a good chance for us to see how some new things work," said Vaughan. "We had a new blocking scheme, Sivan at opposite and Mason (Kuo) at hitter. But it's hard to tell against a team like this. You don't really know until you play somebody good."
Their first chance comes Wednesday against the 49ers. The Rainbows won, 3-1, on Jan. 28 in Long Beach, their last MPSF win before losing three straight.
"This weekend was good but we need challenges now," said Hawaii coach Mike Wilton. "We need to find out where we are. I think we're starting to get there but we have a ways to go.
"We did some good things. Our blocking was good but that's something we constantly need to improve on. This is a real pivotal road trip for us. Winning two out of three would be good. Three out of three would be wonderful. It's do-able."
Wednesday Hawaii (7-4, 5-3 MPSF) vs. LongBeachState (8-4, 3-4), 5:30 p.m HST.