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Saturday, October 21, 2000

Wahine sweep UTEP,
but finish sluggishly

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Star-Bulletin staff

EL PASO, Texas -- The University of Hawaii women's volleyball team yesterday became the first team this season to sweep the University of Texas-El Paso when the Wahine won, 15-8, 15-4, 15-12, on the Miners' home court.

But the Wahine (17-0 overall, 7-0 in the Western Athletic Conference) seemed to lose their concentration in the third game and head coach Dave Shoji addressed the problem immediately.

After hitting .448 and .500 in the first two games, Hawaii hit a very uncharacteristic .133, and that raised a red flag for Shoji.

"We played very loosely tonight and gave up too many easy points, hit too many balls out," he said. "We don't want to do that anymore."

Foregoing the postgame radio interview on KCCN, Shoji held a give-and-take discussion with his players in an attempt to quickly come up with some answers.

"We had a little lapse and I wanted to see if the pregame routine and the warmup were OK," he said. "We were just trying to find something that would make us play better. It was just a discussion on what we need to do."

Yesterday's match with UTEP was the first of four matches in Texas over two weekends. The Wahine took an early plane to Houston this morning for their match with Rice (14-7, 3-4) this afternoon.

Hawaii will return home tomorrow and then fly back to Texas next weekend for matches at Texas Christian University and Southern Methodist University.

Sophomore outside hitter Lily Kahumoku led the Wahine in kills yesterday for the 13th time this season (14) while hitting .462. Junior middle blocker Veronica Lima had 13 kills, hit .455 and had seven blocks.

Sophomore setter Jennifer Carey had five blocks.

UTEP fell to 9-10 and 1-6.

Border TROUBLE: Freshman middle blocker Maja Gustin found herself in a pickle at the U.S. border on Thursday when she, senior defensive specialist Aven Lee, assistant coach Charlie Wade and sports information director Derek Inouchi, were returning on foot from Juarez, Mexico.

Gustin, a Slovenian citizen, ran into a zealous U.S. border official who detained her for two hours for not carrying the proper paperwork to re-enter.

Hawaii def. UTEP, 15-8, 15-4, 15-12

Wahine (17-0, 7-0WAC)

	g	k	e	att	pct.	bs	ba	d
Willoughby	2	7	6	14	.071	0	1	8
Carey	3	1	0	4	.250	0	7	2
Sudduth	3	8	4	14	.286	0	0	8
Kahumoku	3	14	2	26	.462	2	1	7
Lima	3	13	3	22	.455	0	5	2
Gustin	3	4	3	10	.100	0	3	4
Vakasausau	1	0	0	0	.000	0	0	0
Nikolic	1	2	0	2	1.000	0	2	1
Gomez-Tukuafu	1	0	0	0	.000	0	0	0
Lee	2	0	0	1	.000	0	0	4
Duggins	1	0	1	2	-.500	0	2	2
Villaroman	1	0	0	1	.000	0	0	0
Totals	3	49	19	96	.313	2	21	38

Miners (9-10, 1-6 WAC)

	g	k	e	att	pct.	bs	ba	d
Abbruzzese	3	7	9	29	-.069	0	1	3
Davis	2	0	0	0	.000	0	0	2
Zimmerman	3	9	5	24	.167	0	1	8
Marquell	3	2	0	6	.333	0	3	3
Nosan	3	12	5	20	.350	0	3	6
Gronert	3	1	0	6	.167	0	1	4
Clarke	1	3	2	7	.143	0	2	0
Greeniaus	2	0	1	2	-.500	0	1	0
Brock	2	0	0	0	.000	0	0	2
Totals	3	34	22	94	.128	0	12	28

Key--g: games; k: kills; e: hitting errors; att: attempts; pct.: hitting percentage; bs: block solos; ba: block assists; d: digs.
Aces--UH (4): Carey, Lima, Gustin, Gomez-Tukuafu. UTEP (3): Abbruzzese 3.
Assists--UH (45): Carey 44, Kahumoku. UTEP(31): Gronert 30, Marquell.
T-1:20. Officials: Annette Cottle, Rory Arisumi.

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UH Athletics
Ka Leo O Hawaii