Friday, October 12, 2001
BEFORE Hawaii-Hilo's shocking win over Hawaii Pacific at home Saturday, Emily Hutchinson predicted that her team would beat Hawaii Pacific and end the nation's second-longest NCAA Division II winning streak. Hilo star not surprised
by upset win over HPUBy Jerry Campany
jcampany@starbulletin.comThe sophomore outside hitter came right out and said it the morning of the match:
"Hell, yeah -- we will beat them."
It may have just been the confidence that leads all collegiate athletes into battle, or it may have been the experience that comes with a lifelong devotion to a simple game. It could have been the fact that she expects to win every time she steps on the floor.
Whatever it was, Hutchinson and her teammates knew that their 1-7 team could not keep playing so well and continue losing volleyball games.
"I've never been on a team that is this good and loses this much," Hutchinson said.
First of all, Hutchinson knows winning as much as anybody. Like all prep athletes lured to the volleyball capital of the world to ply her trade, she has an extensive list of accomplishments collected around her native Corvallis, Ore.
She was a league MVP once and became a fixture on her region's many all-tournament teams. She placed in three throwing events in Oregon's state track and field championships. Then she came to Hilo, and the winning stopped, but the hard work didn't.
Hutchinson is one of the hardest workers on a team full of them, partly because she is always coming back from some sort of injury. She played in every game for the Vulcans last year, despite a nagging and frustrating case of turf toe, and has missed only six this year while fighting off a bone bruise on her foot and recurring tendinitis in both knees.
But that doesn't stop the right-side hitter from being out on the floor every time her team needs her or getting up at the crack of dawn to work out and doing it again before she turns in at night.
She doesn't work out constantly out of any sense of duty to herself or her team. She doesn't do it because her major is exercise physiology. She punishes herself because she likes it.
"It (working out) is fun, just something I like to do," Hutchinson said. "Like some people like to go bowling all the time, I like to lift and run."
Helping to turn around a losing program is simply a by-product of the young woman's lifestyle.
The Vulcans had lost 24 times in the sophomore's 39 collegiate contests, and with Chaminade joining Brigham Young-Hawaii and Hawaii Pacific near the top of the Pacific West Conference's standings, it seemed her team would be the fodder for at least one more campaign.
But after visiting Honolulu and putting a scare into the nation's No. 1 team in front of the nation's loudest crowd a month earlier, Hilo made a stand. It set aside the fact that it was a team without a senior and did what no team this century had been able to do -- beat HPU.
And they did it with a team largely made up of women 1 1/2 years removed from high school. Hutchinson -- one of seven sophomores on the team -- will turn 20 tomorrow and expects to have her team on its way to a national championship by the time she turns 21.
As shocking as the win was for the rest of the PacWest, it was all part of the plan for Hutchinson and Hilo.
They know how young they are, that accomplishments like those of the Sea Warriors don't come over night. But they are closer than they were just a week ago.
"We know what we can do if everybody wants to stick with it," Hutchinson said.
Derek Anderson, BYUH water polo: The freshman has stepped up to help take some pressure off teammate Vanja Kalabic, beating Occidental for six goals in a 21-10 blowout, then scoring two more in a 20-10 beating of Cal Tech later that day. He also had a hat trick Wednesday in a 13-8 win over Santa Cruz. [TOP PERFORMERS]
Megan Denman, Hawaii-Hilo volleyball: The setter matched Nia Tuitele in the Vulcans' upset over Hawaii Pacific last Saturday. Denman dished out 36 assists, dug up 16 balls and added six kills in the win, all career-highs for the sophomore.
Fleurette Miranti and Marissa Matsuda, Hawaii Pacific tennis: The duo won the Dillingham Grand Prix doubles title Monday, sweeping through the draw unchallenged until the finals, when they came back after losing the first set.
Nathalia Jung, Hawaii-Hilo tennis: The junior from Brazil shocked the field at the Dillingham Grand Prix, beating the top three seeds to become the first Vulcan to win the event.
Audrey Brady, Chaminade volleyball: The junior middle blocker led the Silverswords past BYUH, pounding down 16 kills while getting 11 digs and four blocks.
Hawaii Pacific
BYU-Hawaii
Chaminade
U.H. Hilo