The turnaround started even before practice formally began.
Coming off a five-set loss to UC San Diego on Wednesday, the University of Hawaii men’s volleyball team got an early start in preparing for Friday’s rematch with the Tritons.
“They came into the practice gym (on Thursday) and literally started running practice and warming up on their own,” UH coach Charlie Wade said. “They were definitely hungry to put the work in to give us every chance to get a win.”
The third-ranked Rainbow Warriors responded with an efficient performance on Friday and avenged the loss with a 25-22, 25-20, 25-19 sweep of the 10th-ranked Tritons at RIMAC Arena in La Jolla, Calif.
“Hungry is a good way to describe it,” UH middle blocker Guilherme Voss said of the atmosphere in practice on Thursday. “Everyone was just motivated out of their mind. We weren’t going to let it happen again.”
Hawaii outside hitter Spyros Chakas put away 15 kills in 20 attempts with one error in a .700 hitting performance and the Warriors (14-3, 1-1 Big West) hit .429 as a team to earn a split of their opening series of the Big West season.
Setter Jakob Thelle distributed 36 assists, opposite Dimitrios Mouchlias finished with eight kills and Filip Humler put away seven kills in 11 attempts off the bench.
“Jakob did a nice job of getting all of his hitters involved and we were both productive and efficient tonight,” Wade said.
UCSD outside hitter Kyle McCauley led the Tritons with 17 kills on .345 hitting. Ryan Ka finished with three kills with six errors after putting away 19 kills on Wednesday and UCSD (8-7, 1-2) hit .222 as a team. The Tritons committed 20 attack errors and 11 service errors.
Thelle was in on three of UH’s eight blocks, and libero Brett Sheward tied his career high with 10 digs.
“Certainly it was a better defensive effort frontcourt and backcourt tonight,” Wade said.
Chakas accounted for UH’s lone ace of the night, but the Warriors were still able to dictate points from the service line.
“Filip had a nice turn where he changed the speed a little bit. He didn’t go hard every time, and just changing the rhythm and mixing it up a little bit can have value,” Wade said. “We talked about serving aggressive is not always velocity and we saw that tonight and we were able to create point-scoring chances.”
Humler came off the bench in the first set in place of outside hitter Chaz Galloway, who Wade said is still “not 100%” in his return from an ankle injury that sidelined him for nine matches earlier this season.
Middle blocker Max Rosenfeld also provided a spark off the bench with five kills in six attempts and two blocks to complement Voss’ six kills in the middle.
The Warriors hit .192 on Wednesday in dropping the first two sets, winning the next two, then faltering midway through the fifth. They got the attack rolling early on Friday and put away 15 kills with two errors for a .464 attack percentage in the opening set. Chakas hammered six kills in the set and UH took a 20-18 lead on back-to-back kills from Mouchlias. UCSD fought off two set points before Thelle fed Rosenfeld in the middle to end the set.
UH posted five blocks in the second set, two coming in a 7-2 run midway through the set. Chakas capped the surge with consecutive kills and Thelle finished off the set with a solo block on Ka.
Chakas served up UH’s lone ace and Humler had a kill and a block in a 7-1 UH run early in the third set. The Warriors opened up an 18-10 lead on their way to finishing off the sweep.
The Warriors return home for a nonconference series with No. 11 Lewis on March 10 and 12 at SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center.
