Every player on the Hawaii men’s volleyball roster decided to become a Rainbow Warrior for exactly what lies ahead tonight and Saturday at SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center.
For the first time since 1996, Hawaii will play consecutive regular-season home matches in front of sold-out crowds nearing the 10,000 mark, as the fourth-ranked Rainbow Warriors welcome No. 1 Long Beach State in a showdown of the top two teams in the Big West Conference.
Saturday’s match was announced as a sellout last week and Friday’s match reached the threshold on Wednesday, making this the first time there were back-to-back sellouts since UCLA came to town nearly 30 years ago.
The Beach (23-1, 5-1) and the Rainbow Warriors (22-3, 5-1) will continue one of the biggest rivalries in men’s collegiate volleyball fighting for the No. 1 seed in the Outrigger Big West Men’s Volleyball Championship.
Throw in 20,000 fans expected over a two-night period and the stage is set for a volleyball setting that rivals any in the world, whether it’s college, professional or international.
“I think our guys have learned to feed off of it,” Hawaii coach Charlie Wade said Tuesday. “For me, personally, it’s so humbling. I think this weekend is going to push us over 7,000 a night, average, and when you start looking around the country, not men’s volleyball, but in men’s basketball, the number of high level name programs that are not averaging what we are in volleyball is truly humbling.”
Hawaii enters the match with two losses in its past five, including a three-set defeat at Cal State Northridge on Friday that allowed Long Beach State to move back up into a tie for first in the BWC with four matches remaining.
LBSU’s only loss is a three-setter to No. 5 UC Irvine, which defeated UC Santa Barbara in five sets on Thursday playing without reigning AVCA National Player of the Year Hilir Henno.
Hawaii swept the Anteaters in both matches at home this season.
The big concern for UH is the availability of freshman opposite hitter Kristian Titriyski, who went down with an ankle injury at the end of Saturday’s match against CSUN.
Wade said Titriyski was “day-to-day” on Tuesday and added nothing had changed regarding his status as of Wednesday night.
Titriyski entered the week ranking fifth in the country in kills per set (4.24) and leads UH in aces with 34, which is 17th nationally.
If he is unable to go, Wade said he has the options of backup right-side hitter Kainoa Wade and fellow freshman Finn Kearney, who moved from opposite to outside hitter prior to the season. He was a starting opposite hitter on the United States U17 team playing alongside setter Tread Rosenthal.
“Kainoa and Finn got their hand up quickly,” Wade said. “If Kristian is ready to go, great — if not, we’ve got other guys ready to go who can play.”
The Beach returned 16 players from last year’s team that won the Big West and finished national runner-up.
They’ve added freshman setter Moni Nikolov, a 6-foot-8 freshman from Sofia, Bulgaria, who is a member of the national team.
Nikolov has already set the LBSU record and is sixth in NCAA history with 82 service aces in 24 matches.
Long Beach State leads the country in hitting percentage (.400) and aces per set (2.83), and is second in blocks per set (2.74).
“It will be emotional, but in a good way,” Wade said. “I think everybody knows they are important matches. Two of the best teams playing each other and it seems like whenever we play there is something at stake. It just kind of goes with the territory.”
Hawaii is 6-3 against the AVCA Top 10 this season.
Seniors ‘Eleu Choy, Kawai Hong, Zachary Thompson and Clay Wieter and junior Kurt Nusterer will be honored after Saturday’s match as part of senior night festivities.
Choy, who has appeared in 74 career matches with 60 starts during his six-year career, said this weekend will be a good test to prepare for a similar stage in two weeks when the tournament will decide whether UH’s season will continue into May.
“This is an opportunity for us to prove as a team we can beat any team,” Choy said. “I think we’ve proved that multiple times this season that we can and we’ve also proved at times when we’re not decent, any team can beat us. I wouldn’t want to have it any other way. I definitely want Long Beach State to be (the team) here for senior night.”
