Saturday, April 7, 2001

Hawaii pushed
to 4 by Alberta

Dejan Miladinovic puts down
23 kills in a tough exhibition
match against the Golden Bears

By Grace Wen
Star-Bulletin

It wasn't quite a race to the finish.

Before a paltry crowd of 2,674 at the Stan Sheriff Center, the University of Hawaii men's volleyball team crawled to a 30-26, 30-27, 26-30, 30-20 win against the University of Alberta. The match was clocked officially at two hours and nine minutes, but at times it seemed much longer.

The Warriors used never-before-seen lineups, including one in which middle blocker Dejan Miladinovic moved to the outside and freshman Maulia LaBarre started in the middle.

Hawaii's leading hitter, Costas Theocharidis, spent the whole night in his warm-ups alongside fellow starter Eyal Zimet, who is still dealing with pain in his shin. Theocharidis was slated to start but felt pain in his knee during warm-ups. Instead of taking a chance, head coach Mike Wilton reworked the lineup and shuffled players around.

"That was a total patchwork quilt lineup that we threw out on the court," Wilton said. "We had some good moments, but at times it looked pretty raw."

Hawaii never trailed in game one but it took the Warriors 40 minutes to dispose of the Golden Bears.

UH relinquished several leads as the Bears caught the Warriors at 25-25 after hitting and serving errors. The one bright spot for Hawaii in game one was Miladinovic, who pounded 8 of his match-high 23 kills in game one.

The Warriors trailed 0-2 early in game two but quickly caught and passed the Bears to take a 2-0 lead.

But Alberta prolonged the match by winning game three with much improved hitting.

Pascal Cardinal led the Bear attack with 19 kills.

The teams meet again tonight, which is Senior Night for Hawaii's Torry Tukuafu and Brenton Davis.

Next week, No. 1 Hawaii travels to Provo, Utah, to play Brigham Young on the 13th and 14th in a showdown of the top two teams in the nation.

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http://uhathletics.hawaii.edu