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Reversals were the theme of the night at SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center.
Just about 24 hours after being swept by Big West rival Long Beach State, the top-ranked University of Hawaii men’s volleyball team returned the favor in a 25-16, 25-23, 25-23 sweep of the fourth-ranked Beach in Saturday’s rematch played before a crowd of 8,818.
“I think for just about everybody with the program, you take it a little personally,” UH coach Charlie Wade said of the bounce-back performance. “It means a lot to everybody in this program to represent this state, to represent the university, to show the fans how much we appreciate them coming out.
“Playing at a high level is something we don’t take for granted. We want to make sure we’re giving it every bit of energy we’ve got and I loved the way our team responded tonight.”
The pivotal point of the match involved a reversal of a call late in the second set when it initially appeared Long Beach State had rallied from a 24-20 deficit to tie the set. Instead, Wade issued a challenge, and after a lengthy review a net violation was called on Long Beach State, giving UH the set and a 2-0 lead in the match.
The Warriors trailed 23-22 in the third set before scoring the final three points of the match and closed out the sweep with back-to-back blocks. UH outside hitter Spyros Chakas stuffed Clarke Godbold on match point for the last of UH’s 11 blocks and the Warriors held Long Beach State to a .247 hitting percentage after the Beach scored at a .484 pace in Friday’s 25-20, 29-27, 25-22 sweep.
“We knew we had to play better defense, we knew we could score better out of system and in system and we knew we could block better,” Chakas said. “But we really worked on our mentality and we came out way tougher this game.
“It’s a difficult team to play against, they’re really good hitters. … It was just a matter of time to figure it out within us and I think we showed today how good of a blocking team we are and how capable we are when we’re locked in.”
UH outside hitter Chaz Galloway led the Warriors (18-2, 1-1 Big West) with 11 kills on 21 attacks to hit .429. Chakas finished with 10 kills and setter Jakob Thelle had 25 assists for an offense that hit .385 with just six attack errors against a Long Beach State team that entered the week as the nation’s top blocking team.
The Beach had been averaging 2.93 blocks per set after putting down 7.5 on Friday, but mustered a season-low two on Saturday.
“When we keep Jakob on the net and give him lots of options we’re really good offensively,” Wade said. “For us it was a get back on track after all the illness and injury of the week. The guys came out and played really good against a really good team, and I think that serves us well going through the rest of the league and heading on the road this week.”
The sweep capped UH’s five-week homestand. The Warriors open a two-match conference road series at Cal State Northridge on Friday.
Chakas said an injury stemming from the previous Saturday’s win over UCLA kept him from practicing leading into Friday’s match with LBSU, when he finished with seven kills and eight errors. He responded by committing just two errors in his 23 attacks in the rematch.
Spencer Olivier led Long Beach State (12-3, 3-1) with 14 kills on .417 hitting and Godbold added 11. Outside hitter Sotiris Siapanis, who had 19 kills while hitting .531 on Friday, finished with nine kills and seven errors in an .067 performance.
“It was a huge mindset change,” Thelle said. “We came out slow (on Friday) and never really got to play our game at all and they just really played their ‘A’ game.
“For us it was changing our mindset to bounce back and play better collectively and play some defense. That’s the grit that we need to move on going forward.”
Thelle opened the night with an ace and added two more to start the third set to tie Rado Parapunov for fourth on UH’s career chart with 114. The initial ace sparked an opening set rout in which UH hit .625 with 15 kills and no attack errors.
“I think that showed how much we wanted the win,” Chakas said. “We came out playing really well, and I think that carried over the next two sets. We came in with the mentality that we had to be strong.”
As on Friday, the momentum of the match hinged on the final points of the second set. LBSU survived four UH set points on Friday on its way to the sweep and again threatened to steal the set on Saturday. LBSU’s serving fueled a 6-1 run, with Godbold firing back-to-back aces, and Olivier forcing an overpass that led to a Siapanis kill, then landing another ace to cut UH’s lead to 24-23.
The Beach appeared to force deuce when middle blocker Shane Holdaway capped a rally with a kill in the middle. But Wade said he issued the challenge that Siapanis had touched the net on a joust with UH’s Cole Hogland during the rally. The eventual reversal precipitated an extended discussion between LBSU coach Alan Knipe and down official Dickson Chun as the teams went into the locker rooms.
“To flip it is a big deal, especially in that moment to end the set,” Knipe said. “I wanted to hear what the call was and where the infraction happened that he a hundred percent saw to be able to flip it and that was the discussion.”
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