A SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center crowd of 4, 727 watched the Rainbow Wahine (5-2 ) bounce back from Thursday’s first loss of the season in a match that went more than three sets with their first sweep.
The Outrigger Volleyball Challenge hadn’t gone Hawaii’s way and was about to get worse late in the opening set on Friday.
Pepperdine guaranteed itself four match points with a 24-20 lead, but Hawaii senior Riley Wagoner had other ideas, serving four straight points to ignite No. 23 Hawaii, which regained the form it showed leading into the week with a 27-25, 25-18, 25-21 win over the Waves.
A SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center crowd of 4, 727 watched the Rainbow Wahine (5-2 ) bounce back from Thursday’s first loss of the season in a match that went more than three sets with their first sweep.
Sophomore Caylen Alexander had a match-high 15 kills and 11 digs and Wagoner tied a season high with 14 kills for UH, which hit a season-best.324.
“They bounced back from just not playing really good volleyball, ” Hawaii coach Robyn Ah Mow said. “We got tough on the service line, taking them out of system and getting them out of the system they want to run, which is fast here, fast there, and everyone doing their job.”
It was a quick turnaround from a five-set loss to Liberty that ended at 10 :43 p.m. on Thursday.
Once Hawaii pulled out the first set, UH rolled from there, leading by as many as 14 points in the second set and nine in the third.
“I think after the loss to Liberty we knew we could either sit here and sulk about it and let this mood carry out the weekend or we could bounce back and turn it around and play as well as we can, ” Alexander said. “I think the Liberty loss, even though it was a hard loss, we can take it out and now there’s like an extra drive.”
It looked like the loss might linger through the opening set when Pepperdine went ahead 24-20 on Hawaii’s fifth service error.
An Amber Igiede kill kept UH alive after one match point and Wagoner, who served the final point out in the fifth set against Liberty, went on a 4-0 service run with back-to-back aces, giving Hawaii a 25-24 advantage.
Pepperdine survived one match point, but Hawaii put the set away when Tali Hakas’ dig lined over the net into no man’s land to give UH a much-needed come-from-behind win.
Wagoner was frozen twice during her service run by a Pepperdine timeout and a four-touch call on the Waves that was overturned. Both times, she responded with a perfectly placed serve.
“At that moment I kind of was just focused on what the coaches were telling me, ” Wagoner said. “Coach Robyn said take a deep breath and just hit my serve and Coach Nick (Costello ) was just talking to me about my contact, and so focusing on little things like that was what I was thinking at that moment.”
Hawaii took the momentum and ran with it in the second set, building a 22-8 lead.
UH led 18-9 in the third set before Pepperdine made a run.
Birdie Hendrickson, who led Pepperdine with 10 kills, solo blocked Hakas to get the Waves within two points.
It was 22-20 when Wagoner put down two straight kills and Igiede got one to fall to end it.
“We just had to keep things simple as Coach Robyn is always saying, ” Wagoner said. “Just make the easy moves and just keep going and finding any way to score.”
Hakas ended up hitting.375 with seven kills, and setter Kate Lang had a match-high 37 assists and really kept the offense flowing through the second set and most of the third.
“I thought Kate did a good job, ” Ah Mow said. “They were kind of guessing like, nope, Amber’s not getting it, OK we’re out here, we’re back row attacking, so I thought she did a good job with set distribution.”
UCLA 3, Liberty 0 Grayce Olson led three Bruins in double figures with 14 kills and UCLA hit.402 in a 28-26, 25-18, 25-20 sweep of the Lady Flames.
Iman Ndiaye added 11 kills and Cheridyn Leverette added 10 for UCLA (6-1 ), which played without middle blocker Anna Dodson, who had 10 kills and five blocks in Thursday’s five-set win over Pepperdine.
Kamryn Bacus, who had a match-high 25 kills in a five-set win over Hawaii on opening night of the tournament, had 12 kills to lead Liberty (7-1 ).
