Hawaii sweeps Tritons

The Warriors win so easily they empty their bench in Game 3

All one needs to know about last night's volleyball match between Hawaii and UC San Diego can be summed up in the first 3 minutes.

That's how long it took Triton coach Kevin Ring to call his first timeout. That's how long the Warriors needed to take a 6-1 lead and pretty much dictate the rest of the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation contest at the Stan Sheriff Center.

HAWAII   UCSD 3 0 Next Up vs. BYU, Friday

Hawaii played up to its No. 3 ranking, using an 11-3 edge in blocks to hold UCSD to a negative hitting percentage for Games 1 and 3. Add 13 kills from Matt Carere and 12 by Lauri Hakala and the Warriors got what they had expected Friday night but didn't get -- a sweep.

It took 89 minutes for Hawaii to beat UC San Diego 30-20, 30-25, 30-18 and continue its series dominance over the Tritons to 35-0. A crowd of 2,699 also saw the Warriors (21-4, 17-3) extend their school-best winning streak to 17 when handing the Tritons (1-26, 0-20) their 19th consecutive loss.

"The difference was the emotional preparation for the match," junior setter Brian Beckwith said. "We bounced back tonight. We put the emotional investment into it tonight.

"We were ourselves tonight, especially with next week coming up. We really want to fine-tune our game."

Hawaii hosts BYU next Friday and Saturday to conclude the regular season and will have a rare Monday practice, according to coach Mike Wilton. The Warriors still have a shot at winning the MPSF title, trailing No. 1 UC Irvine by a game.

"We've got to get better at some things quickly," Wilton said. "We have to get better at serving and passing, get that back up to more acceptable levels."

Senior hitter Jose Delgado, who stayed home Friday with the flu, made it down to the arena last night. He felt better and thought his team played better.

"I think our guys really underestimated (UCSD) Friday," said Delgado, who had started 22 of 23 matches before missing Friday's. "We came mentally prepared tonight, played better volleyball and I'm happy to see that."

The Warrior offense reverted to its efficient self, outhitting the Tritons .341-.042.

UCSD finishes out the year hosting two teams who also won't be advancing to the playoffs: Stanford and Pacific. The Tritons hope to avoid a winless conference season by playing the way they did Friday and not last night.

"The biggest factor was our inability to serve and pass at a high enough level to keep us in it," said Ring, whose team played very well in losing in four Friday. "We were playing catch-up very early on. Hawaii certainly was doing some nice things, but it was more about what we were doing on our side of the net. We didn't serve well, pass well, set well.

"It was just fundamentals and we just got outplayed. And Hawaii's offense was much faster to the pins and we had a tough time getting out there and get up on those guys."

Even Hawaii's "second team" played well in Game 3, behind the setting of freshman Sean Carney and the blocking of sophomore Jake Schkud. Schkud had more block assists (six) when playing in just one game than any of the starters did when playing in two games, including teaming with Eric Kalima for the final two points of the match.

Jon Daze led UCSD with 12 kills.

Notes: UC Santa Barbara All-America opposite Evan Patak may be done for the year. The junior has not played the last two matches and is out indefinitely, according to Gaucho coach Ken Preston. Patak doesn't have enough credits to be eligible this quarter, which began last Monday. ... With two matches remaining in league play, UCLA and UCSB have clinched the last two seeds for the upcoming MPSF tournament. Since Long Beach State has the tiebreaker over UCLA, the Bruins can finish no better than seventh. The April 19 play-in match will be between UCLA and UC Santa Barbara. The two teams meet Wednesday in a conference match that will decide who will host the play-in match.

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