No. 3 Hawaii was more than up for the challenge of playing its first top-five opponent of the season, handling No. 5 Stanford 21-25, 25-15, 25-22, 25-12 tonight.

A SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center crowd of 5,212 saw Hawaii (9-1) drop the first set for only the second time this season before rallying to win the next three for its eight consecutive victory.

Senior Alaka’i Todd led all players with a career-high 17 kills, nine digs and three blocks and Spyros Chakas, who sat out UH’s two victories over Tusculum University last week, added 15 kills, eight digs, five assists and two blocks.

Hawaii hit .346 for the match after starting slow and falling behind a set to the Cardinal (7-2), who played without senior All-American outside hitter Will Rottman, who missed his third consecutive match.

Senior Kevin Lamp had nine kills in his third start in place of Rottman and Moses Wagner added nine kills in 30 swings.

Hawaii senior middle Guilherme Voss and seven kills in 12 swings and setter Tread Rosenthal had a match-high 39 assists, five digs, three blocks and two of Hawaii’s six aces.

The Rainbow Warriors closed out the match on an 8-0 run with Keoni Thiim serving the final seven points. His only ace set up match point that was put away by a thunderous Chakas kill from the back row, sending the crowd into a frenzy.

‘Eleu Choy finished with a match-high 10 digs UH, which held Stanford to a .153 hitting percentage after the Cardinal outhit UH .355 to .185 in the opening set. It was only the sixth set UH has dropped all season.

Hawaii has now won 10 in a row overall against the Cardinal.

The two teams will play again on Friday at 7 p.m.