Hawaii sophomore Louis Sakanoko further entrenched himself as one of the Rainbow Warriors’ top two outside hitters, hitting a career-high .556 with a match-high 13 kills to lead No. 4 Hawaii to a 25-15, 25-15, 25-23 sweep of Belmont Abbey on Thursday at Wheeler Center in Belmont, N.C.
Sakanoko, who only took 18 swings, finished in double figures in kills for the fourth straight match to help Hawaii bounce back from its first loss of the season to improve to 10-1.
He has hit .345 or better in his past three matches and put down back-to-back kills out of a Hawaii timeout with the score tied 22-all in the only close set of Thursday’s match.
Zach Puentes staved off one match point with his team-high ninth kill for the Crusaders (6-6), but Hawaii setter Tread Rosenthal, who played the entire match, set up Kurt Nusterer with a one-handed set that Nusterer hammered down for his sixth kill to end it.
“Glad to get out of there in three sets,” Hawaii coach Charlie Wade said in a phone interview. “Louis made a few errors at the start of the third set, so he was even more impressive than that, really. He’s just matured.”
Kainoa Wade, who substituted into the match for Kristian Titriyski to start the second set, had seven kills and two of Hawaii’s five aces.
UH hit .456 for the match with 10 hitting errors. Rosenthal, who had a match-high eight digs, also had 40 assists, which was 13 more than Belmont Abbey, an NCAA Tournament team from last season, had all match.
Hawaii’s four-match road trip to North Carolina includes matches today and on Saturday against Queen’s, which is approximately a 15-minute drive from where Hawaii is staying. UH will also play Catawba College, a first-year program, on Saturday at 11 a.m. local time in a gym more than an hour away.
The official attendance for Thursday’s match was 1,145, making it one of the biggest crowds ever for a Belmont Abbey home match.
“I thought the atmosphere was great. We had a lot of students here. We had a lot of faculty here, but we also had a lot of people from the community that have come and just watched volleyball,” Crusaders coach Derek Sullivan said in a post-match interview broadcast on the Conference Carolinas Digital Network. “Volleyball is growing in the state and I think tonight was a testament as I saw multiple different high schools here so it was a lot of fun.”
Hawaii won the first set by double digits on a Nusterer kill off of one of 14 assists from Rosenthal.
Titriyski and Sakanoko led the way with five kills apiece and Sakanoko did it in only six swings while assisting on one of UH’s 21⁄2 blocks.
That ended the night for Titriyski, who took nine attempts without an error.
A 6-1 run that put UH ahead 16-8 ended on a rare kill from libero ‘Eleu Choy, who popped over a ball after an earlier dig kept alive one of two Crusaders kill attempts that led to UH finishing off a long rally.
Hawaii had nine digs and 18 kills in the opening set, with the only negative coming at the service line with five service errors and no kills.
UH won the second set by an identical score on a much-needed ace from Adrien Roure, who had served our four times before ending the set with a ball just inside the line near the Crusaders bench.
Hawaii had five aces and 14 service errors in the match.
“Our serving is a work in progress,” Wade said. “Tread is getting back to where he was. Louis absolutely has evolved and at the end, really, it’s Kristian and Adrien and there is so much potential there. We have seen runs where they can do it. I think right now that’s just kind of where we are at.”
UH substituted more freely in the third set, with middle Justin Todd and outside hitter Finn Kearney getting playing time.
Todd had four kills in four swings and was in on a block.
Today’s match against Queen’s will begin at 1 p.m. and will be streamed on ESPN+.
NO. 4 HAWAII DEF. BELMONT ABBEY 25-15, 25-15, 25-23
RAINBOW WARRORS (10-1)
ATTACK SET SERVE BLOCK DEF. REC.
NO. PLAYER SP K E TA PCT. A E SA SE BS BA BE D BHE RE PTS
5 Choy 3 1 0 1 1.000 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 0 1 1.0
8 Nusterer 3 6 3 9 .333 0 0 1 0 0 3 0 2 0 0 8.5
13 Rosenthal 3 0 0 6 .000 39 0 0 2 1 2 0 6 0 0 2.0
23 Sakanoko 3 14 3 19 .579 2 0 1 4 1 2 0 7 0 0 17.0
20 Hong 3 0 0 0 .000 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.0
4 Wade 2 6 1 15 .333 1 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 8.0
7 Roure 2 5 1 10 .400 0 0 1 4 0 1 0 3 0 0 6.5
16 Hazan 2 2 1 3 .333 0 0 0 0 0 2 1 0 0 0 3.0
9 Todd 1 4 0 4 1.000 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 4.5
10 Titriyski 1 5 0 10 .500 2 0 0 1 0 2 0 0 0 0 6.0
11 Kearney 1 3 0 3 1.000 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 3.0
TEAM
Totals 3 46 9 80 .463 46 0 5 14 2 13 1 27 0 1 59.5
CRUSADERS (6-6)
ATTACK SET SERVE BLOCK DEF. REC.
NO. PLAYER SP K E TA PCT. A E SA SE BS BA BE D BHE RE PTS
24 Charles 3 5 4 14 .071 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 0 1 5.0
14 Rodriguez 3 0 0 0 .000 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0.0
10 Puentes 3 9 4 26 .192 0 0 0 0 2 2 0 5 0 1 12.0
28 Elhaddad 3 4 1 8 .375 1 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 5.5
4 Day 3 4 8 23 -.174 1 0 0 4 0 1 0 3 0 1 4.5
3 Leon 3 0 0 0 .000 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0.0
8 Acton 3 0 0 0 .000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.0
17 Morris 3 2 0 3 .667 21 0 1 2 0 1 0 4 0 0 3.5
20 Hockman 3 5 1 11 .364 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 5.5
22 Cramer 1 0 0 0 .000 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.0
TEAM
Totals 3 29 18 85 .129 27 0 1 6 2 8 1 20 0 5 36.0
T — NA. A — 1,145. Officials — Stephen Shepherd, Suzanne Lowry, Amy Milton, James
Stancliff
