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Playing in an empty arena, Hawaii and Long Beach State added a “crowd” noise controversy to their men’s volleyball rivalry on Saturday.
Acrimony over piped-in crowd noise in SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center — meant to provide a semblance of atmosphere as the season continues without fans in-house — seemed to intensify the play on the court and the top-ranked Rainbow Warriors outlasted the No. 7 Beach 24-26, 32-30, 25-17, 20-25, 15-8 to remain undefeated.
After Long Beach State won the first set, Beach coach Alan Knipe took exception to an increase in volume in the second set and discussions — at times heated — over the crowd noise led to several delays in a lengthy set that took just over an hour to complete. The Warriors eventually outlasted The Beach to knot the match and surged away in the third set.
Long Beach State led for much of the fourth set and forced Hawaii into a fifth set for the first time this season.
UH outside hitter Rado Parapunov led the Warriors with a season-high 27 kills — six coming in the fifth set — on 53 attempts with 10 errors and contributed to seven blocks. He also served up two aces, the second coming early in the final set as UH opened up an early lead and pulled away.
“Mostly it was Warrior mentality,” Parapunov said of UH’s outlook going into the fifth set. “We’re Warriors; we gotta defend the aina, the islands. We fight for everything, bodies flying everywhere, it doesn’t matter if it’s the last point of your career, we’re going to protect this house.”
UH (11-0, 6-0 Big West) played without senior outside hitter Colton Cowell due to an ankle injury, and middle blocker Patrick Gasman put down a career-high 17 kills, hitting .481, and was in on eight of UH’s 14 blocks. UH libero Gage Worsley had a career-high 17 digs.
“We’re missing one of our significant pieces and we’re going to need the other guys on the floor to step up a little bit,” UH coach Charlie Wade said, “and you look at our veteran guys in Pat, Rado and Gage, they stepped up, there’s no question.”
Setter Jakob Thelle dished out 59 assists and ended the night after 3 hours and 14 minutes with his fourth kill on match point.
LBSU outside hitter Spencer Olivier put down a career-high 25 kills, Punahou graduate Ethan Siegfried added 19 kills and middle blocker Simon Andersen was in on 11 blocks. The Beach (3-3, 3-3) put down 17 blocks.
Long Beach State, which hit .072 in a four-set loss on Friday, was far more efficient in the rematch and hit .520 in claiming the opening set for the second straight night. The Beach fought off a set point and moved ahead on consecutive kills by Olivier. Shane Holdaway and Andersen then combined on a block of Parapunov to end the set.
Things turned bizarre shortly thereafter.
Early in the second set, the crowd noise swelled before a serve by Olivier, which went long to cut LBSU’s lead to 6-4. The noise drew the ire of Knipe, who had a heated exchange with Wade near midcourt. Several extended discussions among the officials ensued and eventually included UH athletic director David Matlin.
“The crowd noise has been going on throughout the pandemic, I heard it a bunch during basketball. They turned it up at one point and the Long Beach bench started complaining about the crowd noise and I just turned and said, ‘Deal with it, you’re on the road, it’s crowd noise,’” said Wade, who called Knipe’s ensuing outburst “unprofessional, unwarranted and uncalled for.”
“We were struggling a little bit. … It got a little gritty and definitely I think it got everybody’s emotions up a little bit,” Wade continued. “The (UH administration) vetted this out. … It was clearly within the rules.”
From that point, the noise was turned down on serves and up during and after points. When play resumed, UH rallied from a six-point deficit to force a 22-22 tie. There would be eight more ties, UH had four set points turned back and survived three LBSU serves for the set. A hitting error by Siegfried gave UH a fifth set point and the Warriors finally appeared to knot the match when an LBSU attack went outside the antenna. But the set was finalized only after an LBSU challenge that was denied.
UH opened up a 14-7 lead in the third set and remained firmly in control through a kill by freshman Spyros Chakas, who started in place of Cowell, to end the set.
LBSU had seven blocks in the fourth set and sent the match into the fifth on Andersen’s solo stuff of Gasman in the middle.
After closing a four-match homestand, the Warriors travel to face Cal State Northridge (1-5, 1-5) in a two-match series starting Friday at the Matadome in Northridge, Calif.
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