After appearing vulnerable the first two nights of its volleyball season, 10th-ranked Hawaii smacked down a perennial postseason participant from the country’s best conference Sunday to win another Chevron Rainbow Wahine Invitational.
Before 4,033 at Stan Sheriff Center, the Wahine blasted Arizona 25-12, 25-16, 25-20 in a showdown of the tournament’s unbeaten teams. This one quickly developed into a blowout, with Hawaii (3-0) rolling to a 17-7 advantage in the opening set and forcing Arizona to burn both its timeouts 10 minutes into the match.
"We didn’t do much to take them out of their game," Arizona coach Dave Rubio said. "I thought we were tentative and didn’t play with much conviction at all. It caught me off guard because I didn’t think I’d see us play with that fear."
The surprisingly one-sided start set the tone, and the Wahine’s offense, defense and serving never let the Wildcats (2-1) find a rhythm, with a lot of help from the young Wildcats.
"I know they were a stronger team and I was kind of wanting more competitive rallies out of both sides, like it was last night," said UH senior Kanani Danielson, the invitational’s most outstanding player. "I don’t know if they got caught up in a rocky start and just couldn’t get out of it or what."
They did, they couldn’t and — to their credit — the Wahine just rolled with the Wildcats’ misery. Both coaches called Hawaii’s effort "efficient" and all the numbers supported that.
Hawaii hit .398, with Danielson (11 kills), Chanteal Satele (10) and Emily Hartong (seven in two sets) all at .500-plus with first-year setter Mita Uiato. The Wahine are still searching for their block, but they got in the Wildcats’ way enough to frustrate them into .131 hitting, with star freshman Madison Kingdon at negative .250.
"Arizona plays a little higher than Wichita, so it made it easier to get in front of their hitters," UH coach Dave Shoji said. "Our defense dug around them and we really frustrated them."
The Wahine hit .696 in the opening set with only one error. They scored the final five points, four coming with Brittany Hewitt serving and the Wildcats shanking. Hartong blasted two bad passes down around a third kill she created and Kaela Goodman slammed yet another shank into the floor on set point.
"We were more relaxed tonight," Danielson said. "A lot of it is that we had the gap between us and Arizona, but I could feel my teammates being a lot more chill so they could just play their game."
Hawaii’s streak extended to 10 straight points when it scored the first five in the next set, getting three kills from Satele and all the separation it would need. Arizona never got closer than three, struggling with its passing and setting and spraying seven hitting errors to go with its seven kills.
"They are a terrific serving team," Rubio said. "Without that Hawaii goes five (with Wichita State) and potentially loses if they don’t have the jump-serving. Their jump-toss servers really made a difference for them."
Hawaii came into the final night averaging nearly three aces a set — twice as many as any of their opponents. It got credit for just three against Arizona, but five more good serves led directly to points.
Hawaii’s dominance was surprising as much for what led up to it as who the opponent was. It had its moments of futility in Friday’s sweep of San Francisco. Wichita State made the Wahine look silly for extended periods, even as UH won in four Saturday.
Then Hawaii rocked a Pac-12 opponent that has reached five regionals in the past 10 years, and opened its season with a sweep of the Shockers that was just as overwhelming as UH’s performance Sunday.
WSU (1-2) rallied from a terrible third set and a 21-17 deficit in the fourth to capture third place. The Wildcats defeated San Francisco 21-25, 25-19, 13-25, 27-25, 15-8.
WSU’s Camri Zwiesler led all hitters with 17 kills. Teammate Sarah Waldorf collected 26 digs. Jocelyn Levig had 15 kills for USF (0-3) and libero Rebecca Kopilovitch 23 digs.
The Wahine face three ranked opponents in the 24th annual Hawaiian Airlines Wahine Classic, starting Thursday. UH opens against No. 21 Ohio State, which has won its first four. Friday, it takes on No. 22 Long Beach State, which dropped to 2-1 on Saturday when it lost in four to seventh-ranked Washington. The tournament concludes Sunday with UH taking on 11th-ranked UCLA, which has won its first three.
