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La Barre perfect
against Northridge
The UH middle comes up
with 12 kills and no hitting errors
in the Warriors three-game win
It was as perfect a night as any middle blocker could hope for.
Not only did Mauli'a La Barre have a career outing with 12 kills, the junior had no hitting errors in 15 swings.
Can't touch this?
Cal State Northridge couldn't.
The 6-foot-8 La Barre helped lead an efficient Hawaii attack that hit an outrageous .565 as a team in disposing of the No. 6 Matadors last night at the Stan Sheriff Center. Add Pedro Azenha's 19 kills and Jose Delgado's 11, and the No. 4 Warriors made it a quick 30-18, 30-21, 30-22 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation victory in 98 minutes.
"I tried to get the ball to the middles more," UH sophomore setter Brian Beckwith said. "Mau keeps stepping it up day after day, game after game, and I can't ask for anything more
"If he gives me 100 percent like that, I've got to give him the ball."
The combination of the 6-6 Beckwith and the 6-8 La Barre makes for a high offense and a tough blocking assignment for opponents. The Matadors didn't touch La Barre on his first nine swings; the first time he didn't put it straight down was when he didn't take a full swing at the ball late in Game 2.
Northridge dug the attempt and won the point, but still trailed 25-19. It didn't get much better the rest of the way for the Matadors, falling to 3-4 overall and 1-3 MPSF.
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"I thought Hawaii played very well, just like they did Wednesday," CSUN coach Jeff Campbell said. "We're still banged up and trying to find the right combinations. It certainly didn't happen tonight.
"We weren't serving very tough. I think the guys lost some confidence because we served so poorly Wednesday (21 errors). We didn't have as many errors (14), but it did affect the team's psyche. The ones we got in were ... soft. And that didn't help."
Hawaii (4-1, 2-0) passed well, enabling Beckwith to run a diverse offense. He took the middle when it was open, mixed it up with back-row attacks at critical times and took advantage of the isolated block on the outside.
La Barre, in on six of his team's 10.5 blocks, credited his teammates with making his night easier. The Warriors (4-1, 2-0) did play amazing defense, led by junior libero Alfred Reft's 12 digs and nine from Matt Bender, and there was solid passing all the way around.
"You cannot run a middle attack without a good pass," La Barre said. "There's steps to making it work and I'm not going to put the ball away without the good pass and the good set. That's a tribute to the passers and the setter.
"I can put the ball away but without them, it's not possible. It's like the offensive line (in football). Without them, you're not going to score touchdowns."
Hawaii rarely had to play from behind. Northridge played tough in Game 3, tying it at 12-12, only to have Bender's 4-0 service run help the Warriors pull away for good.
"We picked it up in the third game and if we had played like that early, then maybe we could have put up a better fight," said junior All-American middle Brian Waite, the only Matador in double-figure kills with 11. "They won some long rallies. I credit Hawaii's play tonight.
"(La Barre) is a great jumper and we weren't effective on the block. We need to change some things around. If we don't fix things fast, it will get really ugly really fast in this league."
Northridge continues its four-match road trip at Pacific and Stanford next week.
Hawaii will venture to the mainland for the first time next week with matches at UC Irvine on Friday and Saturday.
"This is a good boost for us," Beckwith said. "Hopefully, this will send some shakes into the California teams, letting them know we're coming, ready to play.
"I know that Northridge had a few injuries and travel can do it to some teams. But I'm not going to make excuses for them. Tonight, we made it really tough for any team to beat us."
Hawaii coach Mike Wilton said he was pleased with the outcome.
"Mau and Brian have something special going right now," he said. "And that makes it easier for our outside guys. I know that after Game 1, Pedro was close to .000 (.091 with four kills). He had to be awesome the rest of the way to finish like he did."
Azenha finished strong, with no further hitting errors. He put down 15 of his next 23 swings in Games 2 and 3.
www.hawaiiathletics.com
MPSF standings
| Conference | Overall | ||||
| W | L | Pct. | W | L | |
| UCLA | 3 | 0 | 1.000 | 7 | 0 |
| UCSB | 3 | 0 | 1.000 | 3 | 3 |
| Hawaii | 2 | 0 | 1.000 | 4 | 1 |
| Long Beach State | 3 | 1 | .750 | 5 | 2 |
| Pepperdine | 3 | 1 | .750 | 3 | 1 |
| Pacific | 1 | 2 | .333 | 5 | 3 |
| UC Irvine | 1 | 2 | .333 | 2 | 5 |
| CS Northridge | 1 | 3 | .250 | 3 | 4 |
| Stanford | 2 | 2 | .500 | 3 | 4 |
| BYU | 0 | 1 | .000 | 4 | 2 |
| UC San Diego | 0 | 3 | .000 | 0 | 4 |
| USC | 0 | 4 | .000 | 1 | 6 |
Hawaii def. CSU Northridge, 30-18, 30-21, 30-22
Long Beach State def. Pacific, 30-20, 30-19, 30-17
UC Santa Barbara def. BYU, 30-26, 30-27, 30-32, 31-29
Stanford def. UC San Diego, 30-26, 30-21, 30-24
Pepperdine def. UC Irvine, 30-22, 28-30, 30-20, 30-27
UCLA def. USC, 30-27, 24-30, 36-34, 30-27
Today
BYU at UC Santa Barbara
Pacific at UC San Diego
Hawaii def. CS Northridge
30-18, 30-21, 30-22
MATADORS (3-4, 1-3 MPSF)
| g | k | e | att | pct. | bs | ba | d |
|
| Kneubuhl | 3 | 7 | 6 | 24 | .042 | 0 | 1 | 5 |
| Waite | 3 | 11 | 1 | 20 | .500 | 0 | 1 | 3 |
| Conover | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2 | .500 | 0 | 0 | 7 |
| Rhodes | 2 | 2 | 2 | 18 | .000 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Hanson | 2 | 2 | 4 | 11 | -.182 | 0 | 2 | 5 |
| Bellante | 3 | 4 | 2 | 11 | .182 | 0 | 3 | 0 |
| Nielsen | 3 | 7 | 2 | 18 | .278 | 0 | 2 | 3 |
| Lischer | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 | -.500 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Levoe | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | .000 | 0 | 0 | 8 |
| Totals | 3 | 34 | 18 | 106 | .151 | 0 | 10 | 32 |
| g | k | e | att | pct. | bs | ba | d |
||
| Delgado | 3 | 11 | 5 | 22 | .273 | 0 | 2 | 7 |
|
| Beckwith | 3 | 2 | 2 | 6 | .000 | 0 | 5 | 5 |
|
| Azenha | 3 | 19 | 3 | 34 | .471 | 0 | 2 | 5 |
|
| Bender | 3 | 7 | 3 | 20 | .200 | 0 | 3 | 9 |
|
| La Barre | 3 | 12 | 0 | 15 | .800 | 0 | 6 | 6 |
|
| Dante | 3 | 3 | 0 | 5 | .600 | 0 | 3 | 0 |
|
| Reft | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | .000 | 0 | 0 | 12 | |
| Rasay | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | .000 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
|
| Totals | 3 | 54 | 13 | 102 | .402 | 0 | 21 | 45 |
Aces -- CSUN (1): Bellante. Hawaii (3): Bender 2, Delgado. Assists -- CSUN (34): Conover 28, Levoe 4, Kneubuhl, Hanson. Hawaii (52): Beckwith 49, Delgado, Bender, Reft.
T -- 1:38. Officials -- Dan Hironaka, Wayne Lee. A -- 2,862.
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