Here's the first of a two-night series between Hawaii and UCLA, hosted by UCLA. Interestingly, tonight's match was in their rec hall Wooden Center, while tomorrow's is at the much better known Pauley Pavilion (home of the UCLA men's basketball team and the host site of this year's Final Four). Guess they're expecting a larger turnout tomorrow night.
I've already covered both of these teams already this season — in fact, I covered this exact matchup the first time it happened, at Hawaii's pre-(league-)season invitational. A lot has changed since then. I figured then that the Warriors weren't bound to accomplish much, but ever since then (essentially), Hawaii have been on a real upward swing (no pun intended). The task remains for them to get a big result like they've been getting at home over on the mainland.
And both of these teams have a tendency to play long matches. Boy do they. Hawaii entered having played 11 matches, and 7 of them were 5-setters. UCLA had played 15, with 9 of them going the distance (including all of their first 7). With a return engagement just 24 hours away, little doubt both teams hoped a quicker night this evening.
This match was reportedly supposed to have online video, but I never got it to work. I found audio. I've never liked writing up an audio broadcast, but I hadn't done one at all yet, so I resolved to do a meager write-up for this match. Set one was tight throughout, with Gonzalo Quiroga's serving and Robart Page's blocking edging the Bruins ahead by two, a deficit that held steady for a while. UCLA went ahead three for the first time at 19-16 and then four at 20-16. The Bruins got the sideout coming out of their timeout, and supersub Johann Timmer's serve led to an overpass that Davis Holt was able to gobble up, closing the Warriors to 21-19. UCLA's subsequent timeout iced him, as his next serve went into the net, but Hawaii were undeterred and closed to 23-22 at UCLA's final timeout. Hawaii completed their comeback to stave off two set points and draw the set even at 24, but JP Marks' hitting error on UCLA's third set point gave it to the Bruins 26-24.
The Bruins took the early lead in set two at 6-3. Just as quickly, Hawaii closed it to within a point at 6-5, and for a long stretch the teams traded sideouts. Page eating up a freeball re-established the Bruins' 3-point lead at 14-11, and then a service ace for Spencer Rowe put them up four for the first time, at the 15-11 automatic timeout (UCLA's commentators mentioned that Hawaii were doing commercial radio for this match, which is why it had the 15-point media timeouts). A hitting error from Brook Sedore brought it to 16-11, UCLA's biggest lead of the night. The Bruins' lead extended to 19-13 at Hawaii's charged timeout, and evidently Sinisa Zarkovic was demonstrative at Joby Ramos in his displeasure with one of the latter's sets. The Bruins continued to pour it on, going up 23-16 at Hawaii's final timeout. Page and Clayton Paullin led a double block to end the second set 25-17.
Max Wechsung, who had entered the match once earlier as a serving sub, started set three as Hawaii's setter. I can't really speak to how Ramos was or wasn't setting, since I couldn't see the match, but this is never something a coach wants to do, so I'm guessing it wasn't good. It didn't make for a great deal of difference. After an early deadlock, the Bruins went ahead three at 8-5 at Hawaii's timeout. From 11-9, Hawaii rattled off four straight to take their first lead since early in set one, prompting UCLA's timeout. The Bruins then responded with three straight to make the Warriors' lead very short-lived indeed. The media timeout came at 15-14 UCLA. Hawaii went back to Ramos coming out of the timeout, and they stayed competitive in the set, with Zarkovic's ace tying the set at 17. The set continued with ties to 19 and 20, with Page beating a triple block to put UCLA up 22-20. Quiroga's kill brought the Bruins to match point at 24-22, but Page served the first into the net. Quiroga finished it off on serve receive on the next rally.
#6 UCLA d. #13 Hawaii (26-24, 25-17, 25-23)
Part of me is happy that I didn't miss physically seeing some amazing, epic match, but I'm also a little bummed for a team I've very much come to like in Hawaii that they had such a letdown. It was their first match in two weeks, and while they played sets one and three close, they had to have been missing some of what they had at home against Pepperdine and Stanford in past weeks. Tomorrow's a new day, though, and another chance against these very same UCLA Bruins.
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
