Saturday, August 21, 1999

By Dennis Oda, Star-Bulletin
Newport Harbor's April Ross (14) and Liz Lord stuff
Pearl City's Brandy Kele during the Sailors' sweep of
the Chargers in yesterday's action at the 17th
Iolani Invitational.

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Sailors sweeping
toward repeat in
Iolani tourney

By Cindy Luis
Star-Bulletin

Just how good was the Newport Harbor (Calif.) High girls' volleyball team last year?

The Sailors went 39-1 en route to the state title and their Fab 50 setter, Jennifer Carey, is poised to run Hawaii's offense as a true freshman.

Just how good is Newport Harbor this year?

The Sailors have swept through the 17th Iolani Invitational without dropping a set in nine matches and their Fab 50 player, April Ross, has them poised to become the first back-to-back champion in tournament history.

Not bad considering that Ross, a 6-foot-1 senior, had never set before this week. The hitter-blocker-turned-setter looked pretty comfortable yesterday as the Sailors topped Pearl City, 15-1, 15-4, in a championship quarterfinal yesterday at Iolani gym.

This afternoon, Newport Harbor's semifinal match was against Hilo, which rallied past Harvard-Westlake of California, 10-14, 15-14, 13-8, yesterday. In today's second semifinal, host Iolani met Santa Margarita, the defending California Division 2A champion.

Yesterday, the Raiders topped King Kekaulike, 15-7, 11-7, while the Eagles downed Farrington, 15-8, 15-8. In last night's elimination round of the championship bracket, Pearl City ousted Harvard-Westlake, 12-10, 0-15, 15-13, while King Kekaulike booted Farrington, 13-9, 13-11.

The title match for the largest prep volleyball event in the state is set for 8 tonight.

"April's a volleyball player and that's what we try to get all our players to be," said Newport Harbor coach Dan Glenn. "She played middle as a freshman, hit outside the last two years.

"It's probably the best thing for her for her college future, to be in a position to say, 'What do you need? I can be a setter, I can be a blocker, I can be an outside hitter.' "

Dave Shoji would like her to be a Wahine. The Hawaii coach was in the gym scouting several recruits yesterday.

Ross attended the Wahine's first day of practice last week. The Sailors watched Hawaii scrimmage yesterday morning.

"I'm still undecided, but this would be a great place to go," said Ross, who has narrowed her choices to Hawaii, UCLA, Southern Cal, Washington and Texas A&M.

"I'll play whatever position they need me to play (in college). Moving to setter is fun. It's kind of like a crash course this week, but I enjoy it a lot."

Against the Chargers, Ross had a great run through the front row at the end of Game 1. She had two kills and two blocks during a 5-0 spree that gave the Sailors a 14-1 lead; one sideout later, Ross served the game-ending ace.

Pearl City took an early 2-0 lead in Game 2. But two more aces by Ross and the imposing block of 6-2 senior Krista Dill helped Newport Harbor pull away for the sweep.

Newport Harbor defeated Kamehameha for the 1998 tournament title. Glenn said the Warriors were the best team his Sailors faced last season.

Both Newport Harbor and Kamehameha went on to claim state championships, with their MVPs - Carey and Lily Kahumoku - ending up as Wahine teammates this year. This was the kind of springboard Ann Kang and husband Alan envisioned when starting the tournament 17 years ago.

"We wanted to expose the local girls to different styles of volleyball," said Iolani coach Ann Kang.

"We look for a variety of teams to compete and we also want strong teams that will give a good representation of Hawaii volleyball."