UH digs up rare victory at UCLA
Advertiser Staff
In a frenetic end to 18 years of frustration, the University of Hawai'i men's volleyball team rallied for a 25-30, 30-27, 23-30, 30-23, 15-13 victory over UCLA last night in Los Angeles.
The second-ranked Warriors, who had long played Wile E. Coyote to UCLA's Roadrunner, beat the No. 3 Bruins for the first time in Pauley Pavilion since Feb. 13, 1983. At the time, Dave Shoji, now the Wahine coach, was the Warriors' head coach.
"It feels great," said UH middle blocker Dejan Miladinovic, who became the school's career leader in blocks last night with 478. "We didn't play great, and we had some problems passing the ball, but we managed to pull it off."
Said UH coach Mike Wilton: "The Cardiac Kids did it again."
The Warriors struggled in the first game and struck the basement in the third, when they hit .143. But they dominated the fourth and, despite six hitting errors and falling behind 13-11 in the fifth game, scored the final four points of the match.
"Eyal (Zimet) was serving, so I knew we were going to win or make a comeback," said Torry Tukuafu, who buried a season-high 18 kills and hit .406. "He's a good server. He's very clutch. If this were basketball, he would be the one to hit a 3 with one second left on the clock."
Miladinovic found the floor with a dink shot to close UH to 13-12 in the fifth game, and when UCLA's Cameron Mount hit long, the score was tied. Then UH middle blocker Brenton Davis hammered a kill, and Costas Theocharidis, who finished with 31 kills, bid aloha with a slam.
"We resurrected ourselves," Wilton said. "We were just so flat and going through the motions, but then we came alive."
Despite UCLA's height advantage – its average attacker is 6 feet 7 1/2; UH's tallest player is 6-7 – the Warriors repeatedly attacked the block. "They're big, really huge, but the main thing is we made plays," Wilton said.
The teams meet again tonight. UH improved to 16-3 overall and 11-2 in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation. UCLA is 17-6 and 9-4.
