Last match at home? A given.
Last match for the season? That is the question.
Hawaii will not know until the NCAA volleyball tournament field is announced on Nov. 25 whether its season will continue. What the Rainbow Wahine do know is that they sent their seniors out with a win.
For the 11th straight season, Hawaii was victorious on senior night, denying UC Davis a piece of history. No Big West team had ever defeated the Wahine in their final regular-season home match. (Western Athletic Conference foe Utah State did so in 2007).
Hawaii, playing for pride and its postseason hopes, sent seven players playing their final home match off with a 25-19, 25-17, 23-25, 25-14 victory Friday night at the Stan Sheriff Center. A crowd of 4,774 saw the departing group play a huge part in the win, with senior hitter McKenna Granato putting down a match-high 17 kills, senior hitter Casey Castillo adding 12 and senior libero Tita Akiu coming up with 18 digs.
Senior setter Faith Ma’afala added her ninth double-double (22 assists, 12 digs). Junior setter-hitter Norene Iosia finished with her 15th double-double (20 assists, 13 digs); Iosia was one kill shy of her fifth triple double, finishing with nine kills to go along with a career-high five blocks.
The seniors were buried under lei moments after senior opposite Angel Gaskin buried her seventh kill to put the crowd on its collective feet for aloha ball. Gaskin and redshirt junior middle Natasha Burns — foregoing her final season to graduate in May — stuffed senior hitter Brianna Karsseboom to end it after 2 hours and 11 minutes.
“That last kill was really, really good,” said Gaskin, who transferred from Maryland to play one season at Hawaii. “And that block … really happy to end it like that.”
Hawaii finished with a 12-5 edge in blocks and a 69-62 edge in digs.
“It would have been nice to end it in three,” Granato said. “But a win is a win and that’s what we wanted.”
For the Aggies, Karsseboom had 16 kills and senior hitter Emily Allen added a double-double (10 kills, 10 digs). Senior libero Malia Bolko had 22 digs in her final match.
“I’m so honored, so blessed and so happy with the win,” Ma’afala said. “And I’m ready to get back in the gym with these girls. Fingers crossed for Sunday.”
The NCAA selection show is Nov. 25 at 3:30 p.m. on ESPNU. Hawaii will continue to practice next week.
If not selected as an NCAA at-large team, the Wahine will get a bid to the National Invitational Volleyball Championship. Hawaii might decline that.
The Big West’s automatic NCAA berth will to No. 15 Cal Poly. The Mustangs clinched their second consecutive title on Friday with a sweep of UC Riverside.
It took a while for the Wahine to play like they still have a chance at the postseason. Hawaii’s trademark slow start had them down as big as 14-6 in Set 1.
Consecutive aces by redshirt freshman defensive specialist Janelle Gong helped the Wahine close to 15-12.
At 16-13, Ma’afala teed off from the service line for five straight, a run that included her accounting for two points on an ace and a dig-kill. That put Hawaii ahead for good at 18-16.
Ma’afala’s 5-0 service run had the Wahine pulling away from an 8-8 tie to take control of Set 2 at 13-8. Hawaii, which averaged 1.85 blocks per set, more than quadrupled that with eight stuffs through the break.
The Aggies would not go away, breaking the 15th tie (22-22) with kills by Lauren Jackson and Leonie Strehl to take their first set point. They needed two, extending the match on a hitting error by Castillo. It was just the second set Davis took off Hawaii in seven trips to Honolulu.
Set 4 was a mere formality as well as a stat-padder. The Wahine used two serving runs by sophomore defensive specialist Rika Okino to run away at 10-7 and 23-14.
