It was Stijn van Tilburg’s birthday on Saturday, but it was Rado Parapunov who had a coming-out party. Parapunov turned in his first career double-double with 20 kills and 10 blocks as No. 6 Hawaii defeated No. 11 UC Santa Barbara 25-20, 25-27, 25-21, 25-14 in a critical Big West volleyball match in Goleta, Calif.
It was the first time the Rainbow Warriors (17-6, 5-3 Big West) defeated the Gauchos in Robertson Gym twice in a season. It came at a very good time, keeping Hawaii tied for second in the conference with UC Irvine at 5-3 heading into the final week of the regular season.
The Warriors finish out league play hosting No. 1 Long Beach State on Friday and Saturday. The 49ers clinched the regular-season title with Saturday’s sweep of UC San Diego.
The top two teams earn a first-round bye at the April 19-21 Big West tournament in Long Beach, Calif. Hawaii has the tiebreaker over UC Irvine on point differential. The Anteaters finish with matches against the Gauchos (10-11, 3-5), at Robertson Gym on Thursday and in Irvine on Saturday.
“I haven’t really looked at the (tournament) scenarios,” Hawaii coach Charlie Wade said in a telephone call. “We just want to be playing our best volleyball at the end of the year.
“For us, we went on the road a few weeks ago and didn’t play well (in three losses). Tonight when Santa Barbara stepped it up, we responded. And Rado played great. Similar to what Brett (junior hitter Rosenmeier) was going through with struggles, he kept a good attitude, is hitting with purpose and his blocking has dramatically improved.”
Parapunov was in on 10 of Hawaii’s 13.5 stuffs, including two solo. He had two of the team’s seven aces, splitting the Gauchos’ defense to end Set 3. His 10 blocks were the most by a Warrior since Taylor Averill had 13 against UC San Diego in 2015.
Van Tilburg, who wasn’t feeling well, according to Wade, played himself out of negative hitting numbers to finish with 14 kills, becoming the 17th player in program history to reach 1,000. Rosenmeier added 10 kills and senior libero Tui Tuileta had a career-high 16 digs over the 2 hours and 13 minutes.
“Tui was amazing,” Wade said.
Hawaii jumped out early in Set 1 with leads of 4-0 and 5-1. The Warriors led by as much as 19-12, helped by consecutive aces from freshman defensive specialist Gage Worsley.
Set 1 saw Rosenmeier with his first hitting error in three matches when he was blocked by setter Randy DeWeese to pull the Gauchos to 20-16. After taking set point at 24-18, Hawaii needed three attempts to end it, getting its final point on a Corey Chavers service error.
The Warriors were two points away from taking a 2-0 lead after Dalton Solbrig’s kill pushed the margin to 23-21. It appeared that they would be a point away when van Tilburg crushed a service overpass, but he was called for a net violation and UCSB used that to gain momentum and the lead at 24-23.
Kills by Parapunov tied it at 24 and 25, but the Gauchos evened the match on a dump shot by DeWeese and a hitting error by van Tilburg.
Hawaii broke away for good in Set 3 on a block of Roy McFarland at 7-6. UCSB closed to within one three times, the last at 21-20, before Parapunov took over, putting down the Warriors’ last three kills and finishing it off with an ace.
Parapunov continued his hot arm in Set 4, opening with two kills and the Warriors never trailed. It was 12-9 and then it was over as Hawaii used runs of 4-0 and 5-0 to run away at 23-12.
Chavers led the Gauchos with 21 kills and Keenan Sanders added 13.
