Boogaard saw
the surprises coming

THIS was before all the five-game matches and all the drama and all the derring-do. Before all the comebacks, all the quick sets, before everyone knew all their new faces and new names by heart, after only the season's first two weeks.

It was before Saturday night's incredible win over UCLA in five, the whole team hugging in the middle of the court, Hawaii setter Kanoe Kamana'o crying, she just couldn't hold the emotion back.

It was before all of this.

It was before the season, actually.

But Susie Boogaard already knew.

I had gone to ask her if she really was a "new Boogaard" or a "different Boogaard" the way Dave Shoji had been describing her during those August days when this was all just a daydream.

And Boogaard said no.

She said everyone was new.

She said everything was different.

"Different teammates," she said. "A different chemistry of the team."

She used that word a lot. Chemistry. And "heart." She used that word, too. "Comfortable," she said.

People always say things like this, before every new season.

But we've seen it. In the season's first two weeks we have already felt it. This Hawaii volleyball team is different and new and aggressive and unafraid and wonderful.

There are freshmen, and new faces, and even the old ones, well, we've hardly seen them before.

At least not like this.

Kamana'o was a freshman starter last season, but now ... wow.

Same with fellow sophomore Alicia Arnott. And Melody Eckmier is a captain now.

Because June Jones was an assistant with the Houston Gamblers, and because Howard Schnellenberger was just here, everyone is always saying who reminds them of Jim Kelly.

Well, I am the biggest Buffalo Bills fan in Hawaii, and do you know who reminds me of Jim Kelly?

Boogaard.

Kelly's passes were never the bullets that Marino's or Elway's were. The ball seemed to almost float.

But it always got there, somehow, between two defenders. It took forever. Even when he forced it in there, it looked almost soft. But it was perfect.

Boogaard doesn't seem to have the bombs Arnott does. Freshman Tara Hittle's high-speed arrivals are laser-straight. Boom!

Boogaard's spikes almost have an arc.

But they get there, somehow. And in the same way that Jim Kelly's passes always arrived softly, Boogaard hits a heavy ball.

She looks like a new player out there. A different one. They all do, together. Everyone is new and everything is different.

"I think we're going to surprise a LOT of people," Boogaard said that August day. "I think we're going to have to fight for every game, but that's going to bring us closer in the long run. And I think we're going to do awesome. I think, like I said, about the team and their heart and their chemistry and the talent that all the girls have, and everything."

That sounds a lot like game 5 against UCLA.