The part of the season the No. 3 Hawaii men’s volleyball team has been waiting for is finally here.
The Rainbow Warriors secured their 13th straight win with a 25-17, 25-16, 25-20 sweep of Sacred Heart on Sunday at SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center.
A crowd of 3,214 watched Hawaii (14-1) earn its fifth consecutive sweep against one of five different unranked opponents the Rainbow Warriors have played this season.
That will change this week when Hawaii hosts the Outrigger Volleyball Invitational against three different ranked opponents, including No. 1 Grand Canyon in the marquee match of the tournament in four days.
“I’m very excited. This is what we’ve practiced for all year,” said freshman setter Tread Rosenthal, who had a match-high 29 assists, four aces and four digs. “This is why we’re grinding in the practice gym and in the weight room. It’s good for it to finally be here.”
Hawaii senior middle blocker Guilherme Voss put down 10 kills in 12 swings without an error and added four blocks to lead the Rainbow Warriors against the Pioneers (6-11).
Alaka’i Todd had seven kills and Spyros Chakas chipped in six kills in two sets.
Sacred Heart pressed Hawaii in the third set and tied the match at 19. Sophomore Kurt Nusterer, who sat out the first two sets with junior Zachary Thompson, a Punahou alum, earning his first start in a UH uniform, put Hawaii back in front with a kill and then served the next four UH points to get to match point.
Voss ended another quick evening with a thunderous slam from the middle.
“A lot of good stuff. Fourteen (kills), zero (errors), 20 (swings) out of the middle and we’ve been talking about getting the middle involved more,” Hawaii coach Charlie Wade said. “Liked the serving numbers too, both the production and the efficiency.”
Hawaii had 10 aces and 10 service errors for the match with Nusterer earning two aces during his final serving run.
Hawaii got off to a much better start than it did in Friday’s sweep, hitting ..375 in the first set with Voss leading the way with four kills in four swings.
Five different players had at least two kills, including Thompson, who played for just the second time this season and forgot to shake hands with the coaching staff when introduced pregame.
“First time. I didn’t mean to miss the coaches. A little mistake on my part,” he said with a smile.
Senior Keoni Thiim came in to serve for Voss with UH ahead 16-10 in the first set and promptly made a pancake dig that led to a block by Todd and Thompson for a UH point.
The first set ended on one of five service errors for the Pioneers.
Rosenthal helped UH dominate the second set with a seven-point scoring run from the service line that included two aces.
Chakas closed out the set with his first ace in nearly a month to give him 100 for his career, becoming the ninth Rainbow Warrior to reach that mark.
Voss notched his second block of the match in the third set to surpass Costas Theocharidis for seventh on the UH career blocking list.
Nusterer had a chance to close out the match from the service line but ripped one out of bounds on match point.
UH got it right back on the Voss kill.
Nusterer is one of five Rainbow Warriors with at least 17 aces this season. Hawaii entered the week leading the nation in service aces per set.
“(Nusterer) is at like 94, 95, 96 percent inbounds. As a middle, especially, those guys typically are kind of popping the floater or are kind of erratic for the serve and certainly a candidate for the serving sub and our two service subs were in the game playing at the end,” Wade said. “He’s worked on it a lot. He’s more conscious of his ball flight and he’s got better hand on ball.”
Sacred Heart junior setter Cade Trujillo, a Kamehameha alumnus, set a career high with 13 assists, three digs and a kill. He had only played in two sets in his collegiate career before Sunday.
The Rainbow Warriors will remain in the top four in the AVCA rankings this week for an 89th consecutive week. Hawaii will open the tournament on Thursday against No. 14 Lewis.
NO. 3 HAWAII DEF. SACRED HEART 25-17, 25-16, 25-20
PIONEERS (6-11)
S K E ATT PCT D BA PTS
Mucherino 312 4 28 .286 5 3 14.5
Santa Cruz 3 3 5 14 -.143 2 1 3.5
Benscoter 3 5 1 8 .500 0 5 7.5
Popp 3 2 0 5 .400 0 1 2.5
Olczyk 3 0 0 0 0 4 0 0.0
Henricks 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 1.0
Trujillo 2 1 1 3 .000 3 0 1.0
Chow 2 2 2 7 .000 0 1 2.5
Hoelperl 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.0
Payne 1 0 0 0 0 1 2 1.0
Berry 1 1 0 2 .500 0 0 1.0
Pido 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0.0
Beranek 1 2 2 9 .000 2 1 2.5
MATCH 3 28 15 76 .171 18 14 37
RAINBOW WARRIORS (14-1)
S K E ATT PCT D BA PTS
Todd 3 7 3 15 .267 3 3 10.5
Choy 3 0 0 0 010 0 0.0
Voss 310 0 12 .833 1 4 13.0
Thiim 3 3 2 6 .167 3 0 4.0
Rosenthal 3 1 0 1 1.000 4 2 6.0
Sakanoko 3 2 2 6 .000 1 1 2.5
Thompson 2 2 0 5 .400 0 1 2.5
Chakas 2 6 1 11 .455 5 0 7.0
Galloway 1 2 2 6 .000 1 0 2.0
Nusterer 1 2 0 3 .667 1 0 4.0
Taylor 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.0
MATCH 3 35 10 65 .385 29 11 51.5
Service aces — Sacred Heart 2 (Mucherino, Henricks). Hawaii 10 (Rosenthal 4, Nusterer
2, Todd, Voss, Thiim, Chakas).Service errors — Sacred Heart 15 (Mucherino 4, Popp 4,
Trujillo 4, Santa Cruz 2, Chow). Hawaii 10 (Thiim 2, Sakanoko 2, Rosenthal, Nusterer,
Voss, Chakas, Thompson, Galloway). Assists — Sacred Heart 28 (Trujillo 13, Payne 10,
Olczyk 3, Santa Cruz 2). Hawaii 33 (Rosenthal 29, Todd 2, Thiim, Galloway). Block solos — Sacred Heart none. Hawaii 1 (Todd). Ball handling errors — Sacred Heart none.
Hawaii 1 (Sakanoko). Reception errors — Sacred Heart 10 (Olczyk 4, Henricks 2, Santa
Cruz, Chow, Berry, Beranek). Hawaii 2 (Chakas, Choy). A — 4,851. Officials — Dickson
Chun, Mark Nakashima, Ryan Sakagawa, Hunter Haliniak.
