Monday, April 20, 1998

Rainbows
have a score to settle
with the Waves

UH meets Pepperdine
in the semis of the MPSF men's
volleyball tourney

By Cindy Luis
Star-Bulletin

The invisible pencil box Mike Wilton carries around is full of erasers. Every time a player makes a not-so-perfect play, the University of Hawaii men's volleyball coach tosses one out on the court.

The challenge for the recipient is to erase the mistake by salvaging the play. Turn a bad pass into a good set. Turn a bad set into a good kill.

The sumo-size eraser comes out this week as the fourth-ranked Rainbows prepare for their Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Tournament semifinal match with No. 2 Pepperdine. A victory Thursday at UCLA's Pauley Pavilion would eradicate the worst memory of Hawaii's season: when the Waves crashed through the Stan Sheriff Center like it was a Malibu beach house for two straight-set sweeps May 6-7.

First team honors for UH's Andre Breuer Star-Bulletin staff University of Hawaii middle blocker Andre Breuer was named to the first team of the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation men's volleyball team today. Breuer was one of four Rainbows receiving MPSFAll-Conference honors. Named to the third team were Naveh Milo and Dejan Miladinovic. Honorable mention honors went to Jason Salmeri. Pepperdine's Scott Wong, a graduate of Punahou, was named freshman of the year. George Roumain of Pepperdine was named player of the year. Coach of the year honors went to Rick McLaughlin of Loyola Marymount.

"Even though we finished in first place in our division, we are still an underdog because we lost twice to them," Hawaii senior captain Naveh Milo said after the Rainbows advanced with a 13-15, 15-6, 15-2, 15-6 victory over UC Santa Barbara on Saturday night. "We're coming in from a different position than we were in this one (against UCSB).

"But I think it puts more pressure on Pepperdine than on us. We did not play well against them here. The teams are pretty much equal, even though they beat us. I think the first team to loosen up is going to win."

The Rainbows (23-5) admitted feeling nervous about Saturday's match with the Gauchos, but the jitters didn't show until after Hawaii had taken an 11-6 lead in Game 1. UCSB, which used a big rally against Cal State Northridge on Tuesday to advance to the playoffs, stormed back again Saturday.

The Gauchos scored seven unanswered points to take the lead for good. Five minutes later, Jeremy Darner finished the comeback with a service ace, handing Hawaii its first single-game setback since a 1-3 loss to UCLA March 20.

The Rainbows took a sharp breath, then blew back with a gale-force vengeance. The Gauchos scored just 13 points the rest of the way.

"Actually, I think it was good to lose a game," said Jason Salmeri, who put down a team-high 21 kills. "If we had lost later (in the playoffs) against a better team, they wouldn't have given us a window to gain our composure back. What was good was we found out that we can regain our composure and bring somebody in to help us. Once we had our composure back, we had our feeling back."

Composure and consistency came in the form of Jorge Alifonso, the Rainbows' freshman hitter who missed three weeks with mononucleosis. The 6-foot-2 Alifonso took 6-5 Kevin Collins, UCSB's kill leader, out of the match.

Collins had 10 kills in Game 1. He finished with 16.

When Alifonso wasn't digging Collins' favorite line shot, he was helping block it. The freshman had three of his four block assists in the opening minutes of Game 3 as the Rainbows jumped out to a quick 5-0 lead. UCSB didn't threaten the rest of the way.

"Hawaii was obviously able to step up their play after Game 1," said UCSB coach Kenny Preston, whose team finished the year at 10-13. "I had a good game plan. We didn't execute it long enough.

"We had no answer for Salmeri. Is he a senior? And Milo is a senior?"

Preston won't have to worry about those two Rainbows again, or think about Hawaii until next season. He had one parting piece of advice for the Rainbows on how to beat Pepperdine,

"UCLA beat Pepperdine with jump serves," Preston said. "If Pepperdine can't pass, then Hawaii could win. But Pepperdine is an awfully good team. We couldn't do much against them when we played them.

"They block well, they touched our middles every time. If they can do that to Hawaii's middles, Hawaii will be in trouble."

Pepperdine outblocked defending NCAA champion Stanford, 1512-12, Saturday night to eliminate the Cardinal in four games. In the other first-round matches, UCLA swept Loyola Marymount and Long Beach State held off Brigham Young in four to set up their semifinal matchup Thursday.

"I'm glad we could play a tough match and overcome some adversity," Wilton said. "Whether it was Pepperdine or someone else for our next match, we have plenty of incentive. Our incentive is to come back here and play two more (for the national title). Whoever is next is just the next hurdle in that odyssey."

NOTES: Princeton and Lewis have already earned spots in the national championship tournament, April 30-May 2 at the Stan Sheriff Center. Princeton (17-7) defeated Rutgers-Newark in the East final for the Tigers' first-ever final four appearance, and Lewis topped Loyola-Chicago in the Midwest final for the Flyers' second trip. Lewis lost to Hawaii in a 1996 national semifinal.

http://uhathletics.hawaii.edu