Clay Wieter didn’t have to wait long to find out if he would get to play against his former team Wednesday night.
The senior transfer from Lindenwood was in the starting lineup for the first time against a Division I opponent since January and responded with eight kills, including the match-winner, to seal the third-ranked Rainbow Warriors’ 25-13, 25-20, 27-25 win over the Lions.
A SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center crowd of 3,652 watched Hawaii improve to 16-1 with a sweep it had to work hard for in the third set.
UH needed three match points to close it out on an assist from middle blocker Justin Todd to Wieter, who hit .571 for a Hawaii team that hit .522.
“I had a feeling I might start but (UH coach) Charlie (Wade) told me during serve and pass and I got excited,” Wieter said. “I’ve been looking forward to this matchup, obviously, for the whole year. It feels fake because I was talking to them in serve and pass this morning and it feels like a little part of me is still on that team and it just feels amazing.”
Todd, who had five kills in the third set with three giving Hawaii all of its match points, finished with a career-high 11 kills in 14 swings and hit better than .700 for the second consecutive match.
The 6-foot-8 redshirt freshman also had two of Hawaii’s five aces and was in on five of the Rainbow Warriors’ 91⁄2 blocks.
“The way I try to play is just to be reliable. You can set me the ball and you know I’m not going to error most of the time,” Todd said. “Our connection (with setter Tread Rosenthal) is really good and just try really hard to hopefully get a good hit at the end.”
Hawaii used 14 players. Kristian Titriyski played two sets and hit .583 with eight kills and Kainoa Wade hit .500 with five kills, all in the last set.
Rosenthal, the reigning Big West Setter of the Week, had 35 assists and four blocks.
The Rainbow Warriors took the court just 72 hours after closing out a second sweep of national title contender UC Irvine in three days and played nearly flawless volleyball in the opening set.
Wieter had four kills with an ace and Hawaii hit .778 with 14 kills in 18 swings. It did not commit a hitting error.
“We were pretty good. A few service errors was about it,” Charlie Wade said. “Really quick turnaround, we took Monday off, we had a very short practice (Tuesday), and really not a lot of preparation and not a lot of scouting time. We knew it was going to be difficult. They run it really fast and you can watch all of the film you want and it’s a lot harder to defend.”
Brendan Louthain had 10 kills to lead the Lions (4-10), who hit .274 in their first-ever match in Hawaii.
Hawaii sided out 85.7% of the time while the Lions hit .095 with seven errors.
Freshman Adrien Roure had an easy night with two kills in two swings in the first set before giving way to Louis Sakanoko, who played alongside Wieter on the outside in the second.
The Lions used a Louthain solo block on Sakanoko and a Zach Solomon ace to take a quick 3-0 lead in the second set.
Hawaii’s efficiency dropped in the second set and Lindenwood took advantage, pulling to 20-19 after back-to-back hitting errors.
The talent difference between the two schools was too much and the Lions faltered down the stretch with two service errors and a bad set on set point that allowed UH to go up 2-0 in the match.
Hawaii brought in more reserves in the third set and had to call timeout after a hitting error gave Lindenwood a 20-18 lead.
A one-on-none kill by Kainoa Wade for his fifth kill tied the match at 22-all and Kawai Hong substituted into the match and served the next point that ended on a Lions error to put UH ahead for the final time.
“Maybe made a few too many changes there in the third set, but like I said earlier in the week, if I don’t get guys in this week, it’s probably not going to happen a whole lot baring injuries and stuff the rest of the year,” Wade said.
Every opponent on Hawaii’s schedule after Friday’s rematch against the Lions is ranked in the top 20.
