IRVINE, Calif. — No. 1 seed Hawaii avenged its only loss of the season in conference play.
Now the ’Bows get their longtime rival in the final of the Outrigger Big West Men’s Volleyball Championship.
The Rainbow Warriors got a team-high 12 kills from Louis Sakanoko and overcame a slow start to hold off No. 5 seed UC San Diego 25-19, 19-25, 25-20, 25-13 in the semifinals on Friday night at Bren Events Center.
Hawaii will meet No. 2 Long Beach State with an opportunity to win its fifth Big West championship today at 2 p.m.
Adrien Roure, who along with starting opposite Kristian Titriyski was hitting negative for the match in the third set, rallied to finish with 10 kills and a .261 hitting percentage.
Hawaii (27-4), which ended the night hitting .248 after improving its hitting percentage in each set, scored 42 of the final 66 points after trailing for the final time 9-8 in the third set.
“That team has given us all we can handle,” Hawaii coach Charlie Wade said. “We weren’t as sharp offensively as we have been throughout the year, but a lot of that is credit to a tough San Diego team.”
The Tritons (13-14), who recorded a season-high 15 blocks to hand Hawaii its only Big West loss in its final road match of the regular season, matched that total Friday and had the ’Bows frustrated walking to the back after dropping the second set.
Middle blocker Trevell Jordan, who had missed three of Hawaii’s previous four matches, had eight kills on 10 swings and Ofeck Hazan, who replaced an injured Justin Todd late in the first set, added four kills to help open things up for UH’s struggling starting pin hitters.
“I always say that starting with the middles is really important because once the middle blocker on the other side is giving you respect, even if it’s for one moment he’s hesitating before going (to block) the outside, it can determine if it is kill, block or soft touch,” Hazan said. “I think (setter) Tread (Rosenthal) did a really good job of getting me and Tre into the game.”
Rosenthal finished with a match-high 39 assists, seven digs, five kills and three blocks and needed the middles to get the Tritons block off the pin hitters.
Hawaii had only three players hitting in positive figures after the second set and one of them was Rosenthal with three kills.
Jordan had four kills on five swings and Sakanoko was hitting .250 with six kills. Roure and Titriyski each had as many kills as they had attack errors.
“It was kind of the same story as the last game when we won against them, we just picked up on that,” said UCSD junior hitter Leo Pravednikov, who was in on five blocks. “That first set I think we had a lot of big blocks, but obviously it was pretty hard to keep that up for the whole game.”
The Anteaters started the match with four quick blocks and held Hawaii to a negative hitting percentage in building a 15-12 lead at the media timeout.
The Tritons led 16-13 when a service error began a set-closing 12-3 run for the ‘Bows, who had to carry Todd off the floor leading 20-19.
Todd tried to two-hand pass a ball with his back to the net off of a UCSD serve before falling to the ground clutching at his left ankle.
Hazan replaced him and promptly delivered a kill to put UH back in front by two points.
The Tritons didn’t score again as a 5-0 Hawaii run ended the set with Hazan putting away the final point with UH’s second ace.
“The first point I got in, he set me the ball, which is pretty rare for Tread,” Hazan said. “But yeah, I thought we did a pretty good job opening the net up for our pin hitters.”