[ WARRIOR VOLLEYBALL ]
RICHARD WALKER / RWALKER@STARBULLETIN.COM
Hawaii's Matt Bender celebrated during last night's match. He was second for UH with 10 kills.
Warriors dispatch
Anteaters quicklyUH sweeps UC Irvine in 94
minutes to keep its hosting
hopes alive
Zot, zot?
More like zap, zap.
The Hawaii volleyball team made quick work of UC Irvine last night, taking just 94 minutes to finish the 30-27, 30-17, 30-24 sweep. A holiday crowd of 3,544 at the Stan Sheriff Center saw the sixth-ranked Warriors pick up the victory to improve to 16-9 overall and 12-7 in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation.
More importantly, Hawaii kept alive its hopes of finishing fourth in the league and hosting an MPSF Tournament first-round match. The Warriors are tied with Cal State Northridge and Pepperdine for the No. 4 seed; Northridge has the tiebreaker over Hawaii, while the Warriors will finish the regular season next week at Pepperdine.
The Anteaters fell to 11-17 and 5-14. UCI, hoping to earn the final playoff berth, is tied for eighth with Stanford; the Cardinal have the tiebreaker by virtue of two wins over the Anteaters.
The teams meet again tonight at 7, with Hawaii feting its five seniors: Kimo Tuyay, Josh Stanhiser, Jake Muise, Arri Jeschke and Ryan Woodward.
Last night, it was the Warrior sophomores who gave the teammates a winning parting gift, with Pedro Azenha putting down a match-high 16 kills and reigning MPSF Player of the Week Matt Bender adding 10. Sophomore blocker Mauli'a LaBarre was in on six of Hawaii's 10.5 blocks.
Senior hitter BJ Fell led UCI with 13 kills.
"We were playing with confidence tonight," Azenha said. "We didn't play great, but we played with confidence. Hopefully we do the same tomorrow and we'll have a great crowd for the five seniors."
The Warriors didn't take much time in setting the tone for the match. Hawaii jumped out to a 13-6 lead in the first 10 minutes, a span that included UCI coach John Speraw burning both of his timeouts.
RICHARD WALKER / RWALKER@STARBULLETIN.COM
Hawaii's Jose Delgado warmed up before last night's game at the Stan Sheriff Center. Prior to the match, his girlfriend, former UH All-American Lily Kahumoku, was arrested. See related story in News.
"Why save them?" Speraw asked. "If you get behind early, you have a better chance at catching up, than if it's late in the game."
The Anteaters made a game of it, closing to 17-15 on the strength of two blocks by Matt Webber. UCI stayed within two until 20-18, when Woodward served for four points, including his first career ace.
UCI pulled to two again, the last at 29-27, but Fell netted his serve to end it. The Anteaters had 22 service errors, including the one by Fell that ended Game 2 and the one by Paul Spittle that ended the match.
"Two things we need to do better (Saturday)," said Speraw. "Keep our service errors down and stop giving up runs of points."
Both of those things led to the Warriors walking away in Game 2. Azenha's ace highlighted a 5-0 run that put Hawaii up 12-6.
UH led by 12 at 24-12 and UCI never got much closer as the Warriors hit .542 for the game. It was the second time the Anteaters scored only 17 points, the fewest of the season; they also scored just 17 when being swept by Long Beach State on Feb. 17.
UCI gained a little momentum in Game 3, but saw a 9-5 lead turn into an 11-9 UH advantage behind a serving run by Woodward.
The Warriors held off a late charge by the Anteaters to complete the sweep.
"I hope this gives us the momentum and a jump-start for the rest of the season," said Woodward, who also had three kills and was in on three blocks. "Irvine is a dangerous team. They've got some great players. Luckily, we got some help from their service errors."
"We need to cut down on those," said Jimmy Pelzel, the first All-American in UCI's history. "We have to believe we can take it and put up a bigger fight. This is a really exciting place to play. It's what you want for a game, and I hope it sells out tomorrow."
Wilton said he was pleased with the way his team withstood UCI's challenges.
"We did a good job of protecting a lead at the end," he said. "They made it tough on us, but we were able to hang in there when they made some runs.
"I expect both teams to play better tomorrow. They seemed to be a little distracted at the beginning and it took them a good portion of Game 1 to get used to playing in here."
Notes: The seniors from the volleyball team won't be the only ones honored tonight. During the 10-minute intermission between Games 2 and 3, seniors from men's and women's swimming and diving, cheerleading, golf, sailing, women's track and field, water polo, cross country and tennis will be recognized. ... Making his recruiting visit last night was Kamehameha Schools senior all-state player Adam Tuifagu.
MPSF standings
x-clinched playoff berth
Conference Overall W L Pct. W L xy-BYU 18 2 .900 22 4 x-Long Beach State 16 4 .800 23 5 x-UCLA 15 5 .750 21 5 x-Pepperdine 12 7 .631 18 7 x-CSU Northridge 12 7 .631 18 8 x-Hawaii 12 7 .631 16 9 x-UC Santa Barbara 9 10 .477 15 11 UC Irvine 5 14 .263 11 17 Stanford 5 14 .263 8 16 Pacific 4 15 .211 8 18 USC 4 15 .211 6 20 UC San Diego 4 16 .200 8 18
y-clinched regular-season titleLast night's results
Hawaii def. UCI, 3-0
UCLA def. BYU, 3-2
Pepperdine def. Stanford, 3-0
UC San Diego def. UC Santa Barbara, 3-2
Pacific def. USC, 3-0
Tonight's matches
UC Irvine at Hawaii, 7 p.m., Stan Sheriff Center
CSU Northridge at UC San Diego
Pepperdine at Pacific
USC at Stanford
UC Santa Barbara at Long Beach State
Hawaii def. UC-Irvine
30-27, 30-17, 30-24Anteaters (11-17, 5-14 mpsf)
g k e att pct. bs ba d Bemus 2 4 4 9 .000 0 0 1 Pelzel 2 8 5 20 .150 0 0 3 Ford 3 0 0 0 .000 0 0 3 Reid 3 3 0 3 1.000 0 1 3 Spittle 2 0 0 0 .000 0 0 0 Jablonsky 2 7 1 12 .500 0 1 2 Fell 3 13 7 25 .240 0 2 4 Webber 2 5 4 11 .091 0 2 0 Smith 3 6 1 9 .556 0 1 1 Weichert 3 2 2 8 .000 0 3 2 Totals 3 48 24 97 .247 0 10 19 Warriors (16-9, 12-7 mpsf)
g k e att pct. bs ba d Tuyay 3 0 0 3 .000 0 1 1 Muise 2 0 0 0 .000 0 0 1 Delgado 1 0 1 1 -1.000 0 0 0 Reft 3 0 0 0 .000 0 0 5 Azenha 3 16 3 25 .520 1 2 4 Bender 3 10 4 23 .261 0 3 4 Woodward 3 3 2 6 .167 0 3 6 LaBarre 3 5 1 10 .400 1 5 0 Thomas 1 0 0 0 .000 0 0 0 Dante 1 0 1 1 -1.000 0 0 0 Stanhiser 3 6 1 8 .625 0 3 0 Totals 3 40 13 77 .351 2 17 21 Key -- g: games; k: kills; e: hitting errors; att: attempts; pct.: hitting percentage; bs: block solos; ba: block assists; d: digs.
Aces -- UCI (2): Reid, Spittle. Hawaii (2): Azenha, Woodward.
Assists -- UCI (47): Reid 41, Fell 4, Bemus, Smith. Hawaii (36): Tuyay 30, Reft 3, Muise, Woodward, LaBarre.
T -- 1:34. Officials -- Ernest Ho, Wayne Lee. A -- 3,544.
