UH holds off BYU in five
By Stephen Tsai
Advertiser Staff Writer
White-out night.
Senior night.
"What a night," middle blocker Mauli'a LaBarre yelled out in the celebration of Hawai'i's 27-30, 30-26, 30-25, 26-30, 15-12 victory over arch-rival Brigham Young last night in the Stan Sheriff Center.
"It was awesome," UH outside hitter José José Delgado said. "It was packed. It was my last regular-season volleyball match in college. And we beat BYU."
Before 5,550 white-clad fans, the Warriors saved the best for last, sweeping the two-match series from the Cougars and building full steam of momentum heading into this week's playoffs.
The Warriors extended their school-record winning streak to 19, and finished the regular season 23-4 overall and 19-3 in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation. They will host the winner of Wednesday's play-in match between UCLA and UC Santa Barbara in Saturday's quarterfinals.
UC Irvine, as the No. 1 seed, has a quarterfinal bye. The Anteaters will host the tournament's semifinals and championship match. The MPSF tournament winner earns the automatic berth in the NCAA final four.
Because the MPSF has supplied the at-large team in all but one of the past 24 NCAA tournaments, the Warriors believe they need to at least reach the final match of the league tournament to earn an NCAA invitation.
"Our main plan is to keep winning," outside hitter Matt Carere said. "If we do that, we don't have to rely on anybody else."
That was apparent in last night's match against BYU, which had vowed to improve following UH's easy three-game victory on Friday night. The Cougars threw out all of the statistical trends, opting to go with their best offensive lineup featuring Ivan Perez, Yosleyder Cala and Taylor Evans. Data had shown that Perez and Cala are not as successful when both are in the same rotation.
"Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesn't," Perez said. "We try to find the best lineup to play."
At 6 feet 8 and with a powerful right-handed swing, Cala can soar over double blocks. Perez is crafty at "tooling," a technique in which he ricochets shots off blocks and out of bounds. Combined with Victor Batista, an animated middle blocker who answers to the nickname "Bonesaw," the Cougars fielded a team that could smack loud spikes and serves.
With improvement in the serve-and-pass game, the Cougars were able to stay in system, and create opportunities for Perez on the left side, Cala from the back row and Batista on step-out moves.
"They were the way we thought they would be," UH coach Mike Wilton said. "They had us on our heels all night."
But the Warriors refused to go away, partly in tribute to the five seniors (LaBarre, Delgado, Carere, libero Alfee Reft and backup outside hitter Matt Bender) and partly inspired by setter Brian Beckwith, who played on a wounded knee.
Beckwith suffered a bone bruise on his right knee on the next-to-last play of Friday's match. X-rays yesterday did not show any ligament damage, and he hobbled through warmups.
"It was sore," Beckwith admitted. "But you talk to any athlete, and you know you've got to play with injuries. Tonight was one of those nights. I felt I could play."
Beckwith orchestrated UH's quick offense, slipping sets to Lauri Hakala (21 kills) and Delgado (15 kills) at the pins, and sneaking low feeds to LaBarre (11 kills, no errors) in the middle. Carere struggled, with five kills and six errors, but made up for it with eight digs and a statement-making, five-point serve run in Game 2, when he had consecutive aces.
"I was struggling all night with my hitting, but I tried to contribute in other ways," Carere said. "That's the key to being a good player. If you're not doing one thing well, you have to try and do other things well."
Cala and Batista helped the Cougars pull away in Game 4, setting up the first-to-15 final game.
A triple block featuring Dio Dante, Delgado and Carere, following by LaBarre's dancing serve for an ace gave the Warriors a 4-1 lead.
The Cougars' frantic comeback attempts were sabotaged by self-induced errors. In Game 5, the Cougars gave away six points on service errors.
"We struggled in the clutch to make plays," BYU's Perez said. "I would say it's hard to play away from home in front of 6,000 people yelling at you. They got into us."
Beckwith said: "We're never going to give up. You'll never see that from the Warriors. We will never fold. There's always a chance."
After the match, each UH senior performed Tahitian dances, then received plaques. Even Wilton, an ex-Marine whose personality appears to be frozen on "serious," danced.
"I'm just so happy to be part of this team," LaBarre said. "It's a great way to end the season. I've seen guys come in and out of the program. To have it be my senior night ... it's kind of surreal."
Reach Stephen Tsai at stsai@honoluluadvertiser.com.