FORT COLLINS, Colo. » Was Stanford just that good? Was Hawaii just not?

The truth lies somewhere in between, a very painful in between for the Rainbow Wahine volleyball team.

The Cardinal needed only 89 minutes and a bit of self-destruction on Hawaii's part to reach next Thursday's NCAA semifinal meeting with Texas. While Stanford (30-3) moves on, seeking its seventh national championship, the Wahine (30-4) move on to thoughts of next season after getting schooled 25-19, 25-9, 25-18.

“;It was disappointing,”; Hawaii senior libero Tara Hittle said. “;We didn't play our game. I think if we would have, it would have been a totally different match.

“;The disappointment is knowing you could have done better. The result doesn't matter as long as we play our best. It would have been a much better feeling than now, knowing we didn't play our best.”;

And neither did Stanford. But the Cardinal players did everything right when they needed to, especially going on runs of points, particularly in Set 2.

Faster than one can say “;bad rotation,”; Alix Klineman served the Cardinal to an 8-2 lead. At 13-3, Hawaii had no timeouts and little hope of a comeback, and at 20-4, the Wahine tried to gain some momentum to take into the locker room at the break. The frustration came with the Wahine's inability to string points together. It resulted in Hawaii's lowest single-set score of the season.

“;It was weird,”; Hittle said. “;It got so out of hand, we knew we weren't going to win Game 2. They were so far ahead, maybe we started giving up.

“;We talked about playing our game (in the locker room), forgetting about the first two games. It got better in the third game.”;

But nowhere good enough, as the crowd of 2,547 witnessed.

One play early in Set 3 defined how the night went. At 8-8, Stanford libero Gabi Ailes made a blind, flying dig beyond her baseline that landed over on Hawaii's side to give the Cardinal the lead for good at 9-8.

“;I don't think we ever got into our game,”; Hawaii coach Dave Shoji said. “;Give Stanford a lot of credit. They were balanced and kept us off-balance.

“;I thought we were serving right where we wanted, but we couldn't convert. They were the better team tonight, no doubt.”;

Stanford's game plan was simple: keep Hawaii out of system.

“;Hawaii is really good when they're in system,”; Klineman said. “;But if they're out of system, they're one-dimensional.

“;I don't think you expect to have (scoring) runs, especially against Hawaii. Part of it was luck tonight. We couldn't do anything wrong. We've had issues with letdowns in Game 2. This was by far our best Game 2.”;

By far, it was Hawaii's worst. The Wahine had six kills with 12 errors, hitting negative .160.

“;I thought we did a great job controlling our side of the net,”; regional tournament MVP Foluke Akinradewo said. “;Everything was in rhythm, there was great communication with everyone.

“;When I was sitting out during Game 2, relaxing a little, it was great to watch. I thought, 'This is beautiful volleyball.' “;

Stanford had a very balanced offense, with all five attackers finishing with six kills or more. The Cardinal were led by seniors Akinradewo and Erin Waller with eight kills each. Waller, fifth on the team in kills, had one of the best nights of her career with no errors on nine attempts (.889).

The Cardinal hit .363 as a team to the Wahine's .053.

Hawaii is the only school to have a winning record against Stanford (17-13), but the Cardinal continued to close the gap with their ninth win in 10 meetings against the Wahine.

“;I always love playing Hawaii,”; Stanford coach John Dunning said. “;Hawaii has a great coach, they play hard every play. I hadn't seen Kanani (Danielson), Amber (Kaufman) and Jamie play much. They are very explosive and that makes you be afraid.

“;Our team knew it would be easy to let up, but they did a good job of working hard at one of our goals. And that was being a team.”;

That was something Hawaii couldn't sustain last night.

“;We had no 'team' “; out there,”; Shoji said. “;We were very tentative to start. We never passed well enough to run any kind of offense. Something was missing out there tonight.”;

All-regional tournament team

Kanani Danielson and Jamie Houston, Hawaii; Stephanie Lynch and Kristen Arthurs, Purdue; Alix Klineman, Cassidy Lichtman and Foluke Akinradewo (MVP), Stanford.