UCLA men’s volleyball had 11 set points in the first set but couldn’t close it out.
The No. 6 Bruins (17-9, 10-8 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation) eventually fell Saturday to the No. 4 Rainbow Warriors (24-4, 14-4) in four sets on senior night.
Hawaii took the first set 41-39, marking UCLA’s highest-scoring set since a five-set win over the Rainbow Warriors in 2001 and the Bruins highest-scoring set in the 25-point-game era.
UCLA outhit Hawaii .356 to .217 but faltered from the service line – the Bruins tallied 15 service errors in the first set alone.
“I was really disappointed in the first set that the seniors we started didn’t get the opportunity to pull off that set,” said coach John Speraw. “We had a crazy number of kills and outhit them by a significant margin, but 15 missed serves in a set is crazy.”
Serving continued to be an issue for UCLA for the remainder of the match. The Bruins missed 31 serves on the night – the most they’ve missed in a match this season.
“I think we can improve our serves under pressure,” said redshirt junior middle blocker Eric Sprague. “We have been missing a lot of serves off of being iced, so there’s definitely room for improvement.”
The Rainbow Warriors took the second set 25-23, and neither team hit above .125.
UCLA rebounded in the third set to take an early 6-0 lead thanks to a service run by senior middle blocker Mitch Stahl. The Bruins never trailed and took the set 25-18.
The fourth set was again decided by a close margin, but UCLA again failed to pull of the win. Hawaii took the set 25-22 to win the match.
“We were right there with them,” Sprague said. “There were a number of plays that if they went slightly different could have changed the entire match.”
Sprague was second on the team with 11 kills behind junior outside hitter Jake Arnitz, who notched a match-high 14 kills.
At the close of the match, the Bruins honored seniors Stahl, libero/outside hitter Jackson Bantle, outside hitter Michael Fisher and setter Hagen Smith. All four started and played throughout the thrilling first set.
“It was probably one of the most fun times I’ve had, playing with all the seniors for our last time together,” Smith said. “That whole aspect was great, and we were playing for each other.”
Speraw said that this class of seniors is particularly special to him because they were his first recruiting class at UCLA.
“There was a lot of excitement when they first came in, and I think they’ve had some wonderful opportunities here and a final four,” Speraw said. “Unfortunately this year hasn’t gone as smoothly as I think we all would have hoped, but they still have a chance and are going to go out and play hard.”