A win is a win, no matter how ugly.
Hawai’i looked good … on paper … Saturday night. The boxscore reflects that with four attackers with eight or more kills, a team hitting percentage of .324, five aces, a 6-2 edge in blocks.
Still, it was anything but pretty for much of the 89 minutes against struggling UC Riverside at SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center. The Rainbow Wahine survived the sloppiness to remain tied with UC Santa Barbara at the top of the Big West volleyball standings.
Senior hitter Brooke Van Sickle again carried the team on both ends of the court, with a match-high 14 kills and just one late hitting error to go along with four aces. It was her 30th career double-digit match and, for the second consecutive match, came up one dig shy of a double-double with nine.
Van Sickle hit .520 with her lone error coming on a tight set on the Wahine’s first match point. Her beach partner, sophomore middle Amber Igiede, finished it off with her eight kill.
Sophomore hitter Riley Wagoner added 13 kills and the team’s other ace. Freshman setter Kate Lang had her seventh double-double with 37 assists and 10 digs.
Isabella Scarlett and Deja Bickers each had eight kills for the Highlanders (5-17, 1-11) who only dressed 11 players due to injuries. Libero Zoey Seput had 11 of the team’s 43 digs.
Hawai’i ran its all-time record against UCR to 29-0.
“I think this weekend I was able to distribute the ball to whoever I wanted,” Lang said. “The passing was great this week and I’m happy with that.
“The best part about setting you get to set whoever you want.”
It was a balanced attack with four attackers getting between 17 and 27 sets. The fifth attacker, senior middle Sky Williams had 13 swings with four kills and one error.
“I don’t want to take anything away from the girls, I’m happy we won, especially in three,” Wahine coach Robyn Ah Mow said. “I know we can play a lot better. It was up and down, up and down.”
The “up” was the numerous one-on-one situations that Lang was able to give her hitters.
“Those one-on-ones are a hitter’s dream, especially when your middles take both blockers with them or Kate fakes them out,” Wagoner said. “It’s great when you get it.”
Wagoner had six of her kills in Set 3 where the Wahine pulled away for good at 8-6 on Wagoner’s ace.
“The Wahine head back on the road with matches at Cal State Fullerton on Friday and at Long Beach State next Saturday. On Saturday, the Titans (9-10, 9-9) were swept at Cal State Bakersfield, and Beach (9-14, 3-9) lost its fifth straight when being swept at Cal Poly.
Prior to hosting the Wahine, Fullerton will host Beach on Thursday. Earlier this season, Hawai’i swept Beach and hung on for a 3-2 win over the Titans in Honolulu.
“We’ll work on being patient going into Fullerton,” Ah Mow said. “I don’t think we did a good job of that and it went five. Everything was coming up (courtesy of the Titans’ digging). And we need to pick up our serving.”
Van Sickle again enjoyed extended stays at the service line. On Friday against UC Davis, she had four aces during a 9-0 serving run. On. Saturday, she had two consecutive aces in Set 2 that ha the Wahine up early at 4-1.
One of the Wahine’s bad habits returned, that of giving up runs of points. In Set 1, the Wahine were cruising at 21-11 only to have the Highlanders three kills, a block, an ace and a UH hitting error to pull to 21-18.
At 22-19, two kills by Van Sickle sandwiched a block by Williams and Martyna Leoniak of Marina Gonzales.
The match saw sophomore midde-turned-opposite Tiffany Westerberg make her seventh appearance of the season when replacing Leoniak with the Wahine leading 5-3 in Set 3. She finished with one kill and a block assist.
Attendance was capped at 500 for both UC Davis and UC Riverside. When Hawai’i next plays at home, on Nov. 12 against UC Irvine, the arena will be allowed to be at full capacity.
“I’m super excited to have the full packed stands again,” Wagoner said.
It is too bad that the attendance was well under the designated 500. I read in a number of places (not here) that the 500 seats were accounted for. I wish the companies who donate would not have asked for the seats if no one was going to attend so the real (and vocal) fans could go.
They said All tickets were spoken for
Not sure who had tickets That didnt Show
I supposed people could have told UH They wouldnt use them But didnt happen
I Dont know How accurate the 350 is The turnstyle count has been Off for years
Fridayʻs count went With tickets issued Not turnstyle And i Dont know if They added the pass gate number
It felt like there were more on Friday Not like Riverside was going to be a big draw