Homecoming meant returning to the Stan Sheriff Center, returning to an effective middle attack and returning to the win column. It also was a nod to Hawaii’s past, with senior Nikki Taylor moving up the all-time kill chart on Friday night.
The All-America opposite put down a match-high 20 kills and the Rainbow Wahine put last weekend’s loss at Long Beach State behind them via a 25-14, 25-21, 24-26, 25-18 win over UC Irvine. Taylor moved past All-American Karrie Trieschman for 13th place, her sixth match this season with 20 or more kills giving her 1,250.
A crowd of 5,502 saw Hawaii (13-5, 6-1 Big West) run its record to 35-0 over UC Irvine (7-14, 2-5) after 2 hours and 12 minutes. Although the Anteaters never were in danger of missing their red-eye flight back to Los Angeles, they did make things interesting.
“It came down to the little plays, and I think we did better at that in some areas, better than we did in the last game,” said junior middle Emily Maglio, who finished with eight kills. “We’ve been working on passing and setting the middles. We need to keep working on that.”
Annie Mitchem, playing middle for three sets and on the left for Set 3, finished with nine kills, her only error coming on a line shot that went wide and gave UCI Set 3. Junior hitter McKenna Granato also had nine kills, including the match-ender, to go along with three aces.
Hawaii concludes its brief homestand Sunday with a 5 p.m. match against UC Davis (9-9, 2-3).
“Irvine was a pretty good team, put pressure on us,” Wahine coach Dave Shoji said. “We were forced to go to Nikki way too much.”
Taylor had 58 of the team’s 158 swings, hitting .190.
Set 1 was highlighted by the return of Hawaii’s middle attack and Taylor continuing to move up the kill list. Maglio, who had just two kills in the loss at Long Beach State on Oct. 8, had five in the opening 24 minutes, with no errors on seven swings, and Mitchem added two.
Taylor passed Trieschman (1,232) with her third kill, putting the Wahine up 20-12. Hawaii had as many aces (3) as blocks in the opening set.
After the Wahine jumped out to a 17-12 lead in Set 2, the Anteaters went on a 5-0 run to tie. The spurt included Granato’s shot being deflected off the shoulder of Harlee Kekauoha and back over the net for a kill.
Victoria Dennis’ tip shot tied it for the fourth and last time at 18.
Granato’s third ace helped Hawaii gain separation at 22-19 and the Wahine got kills by Mitchem and Kirsten Sibley to take the 2-0 lead.
Hawaii, substituting freely, appeared poised for a sweep. Mitchem moved to the left for Sibley and freshman Natasha Burns replaced Mitchem in the middle.
It was a bit ragged, but the Wahine pulled away to leads of 22-19, 23-20 and 24-22. Once again, Hawaii struggled to close and was unable to put down two attempts to end it.
A tip shot by Dennis tied it and hitting errors by Taylor and Mitchem sent it to a fourth.
“We just made too many errors when it got close at the end,” Mitchem said.
With Mitchem back in the middle and Taylor at the service line, Hawaii righted the ship. Mitchem had two solo stuffs of Danielle Geiger and teamed with Sibley to block Kekauoha, and Taylor added an ace for a 10-4 lead.
The Anteaters weren’t ready to pack their bags, closing to 15-13 on a kill by Dennis. Two kills by Mitchem helped the Wahine pull away for good at 20-14.
Hawaii freshman setter Norene Iosia had 31 assists and was perfect on all six kill attempts. The night also saw junior hitter Kalei Greeley in the front row for one of the rare times this season as she recovers from offseason shoulder surgery; Greeley had a kill late in Set 4.
“Norene hasn’t been real offensive and it’s something we’d like her to do,” Shoji said. “She’s really good at winning jousts.
“As for Sunday, we’re still looking for a lineup.”
Live streaming back on
The Hawaii athletic department and Oceanic have resolved the issue that did not allow for online streaming of women’s volleyball matches this season. Streaming is required by the Big West and Hawaii had been using a single-camera video feed with linked radio audio for its previous home matches.
The streaming broadcast from OC Sports is only available to Hawaii residents who are Oceanic subscribers through OCSports.TV. The telecast is available to both Oceanic and Hawaiian Telcom cable subscribers.
