After its most recent match, a 3-1 loss to USC on March 15, the University of Hawai‘i men's volleyball team completed its 11th contest over the course of 23 days. That type of workload was new for some key freshmen on the squad, who had not been used to playing more than once a week in their native countries.
Members of the team believe the last bye week of the regular season came at an ideal time for the No. 4 Rainbow Warriors (19-2, 2-0 Big West Conference), who return to the court on Friday at 7 p.m. against No. 11 UC San Diego (16-4, 2-0).
In its last idle weekend of the regular season, which also coincided with UH-Mānoa's spring break, the 'Bows had an excursion to the North Shore, where the team practiced at BYU-Hawai‘i and also held a youth clinic for about 150 kids.
"It was amazing. It was good to just get a little time away from here and just get our minds to reset a little bit," setter Tread Rosenthal said. "It was great. They got a beautiful house up there for us and a lot of the fans from the North Shore got to see us play in person, which was pretty cool. It was more of a mental break. Now we're just ready to work.
"Our main focus has been getting our bodies right and just coming up with some new things in our defensive schemes, offensive schemes, just to kind of pack a punch going forward. It was really helpful just to have that time to work on ourselves."
Hawai‘i closes out its regular season with four consecutive weeks of matches against ranked conference opponents on Fridays and Saturdays, starting with the Tritons.
The Tritons enter the series led by senior setter Bryce Dvorak, a former North Shore resident who graduated high school in Southern California. Dvoarak, a multi-year starter at Pepperdine, is averaging 10.10 assists per set in his first year at UCSD.
The Rainbow Warriors split their season series with the Tritons in 2024, winning the first match in four sets before getting swept in the regular season finale for both teams.
"We're really hungry to get going in this part of the season. We've been looking forward to Big West play for a while," Rosenthal said. "I think last year's Big West play didn't really show how good we are and how talented we were at the time. But we're really focused. We're really ready to get started with a good game against UCSD, get a little revenge for last year, hopefully, and just take care of business going forward.
"(UC San Diego is) really good. I think their ranking doesn't show up, but I think they're one of the best teams in the nation. They're tough. They swept us last year. They've got a funky offense that works really well, so it's going to be a hard game. We just got to stay focused and stay on our own side of the of the net."
UH will rotate between series at the Stan Sheriff Center and on the road prior to hosting the Big West Conference Tournament from April 24-26. With only 10 total conference matches to position itself, each contest will carry equal weight in UH's quest to return to the NCAA Tournament.
"Certainly the most exciting time of the year coming up in front of us," head coach Charlie Wade said. "I think we're pretty healthy. I think we've shown at times we can be really, really good, and hopefully we finish strong here. A lot of things to look back on, but to sit here 19-2, I think we feel pretty good and hopefully play well down the stretch."
Christian Shimabuku can be reached at christian@alohastatedaily.com.
