Leilehua's Robin Ramelb attempts to get a kill past Moanalua's Skylan Engleman. Peter Caldwell | SL

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Moanalua's Austin Matautia, right, and a teammate block a kill attempt by Leilehua's Toma Savea. Peter Caldwell | SL

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Moanalua (15-0) completed an undefeated run through the Oahu Interscholastic Association Red Division, winning the league title over Leilehua in four sets, 25-11, 25-14, 19-25, 25-16, Thursday night at McKinley’s Student Council Gymnasium. With the OIA Red championship in tow, Na Menehune is awarded the league’s seeded berth and first round bye in the upcoming 12-team Division I state tournament. 

“This is the beginning of the end of a long season,” said Moanalua’s Austin Matautia. “We just really wanted to get a good seed in states.”

This was Moanalua’s fourth OIA Red championship in a row, their third straight under Moanalua coach Alan Cabanting.

“It feels really good,” Cabanting said on the milestone. “It was a great match, great game on both sides of the court.”

Leading the way for Na Menehune was Matautia with a match-high 15 kills. It was a great bounce back game for the sophomore outside hitter, who didn’t play his best game against Leilehua a week ago in the winner’s bracket final.

“Matautia just came out big,” Cabanting said. “He’s maturing to become that great hitter that everyone’s been saying that he could be, and he’s really starting to step up to it. This was his big night. I know he was upset from the (last game), so he really brought it in the championship game.”

Matautia wasn’t alone in Na Menehune’s attack as senior setter Skylan Engleman had a bevy of options, doling out 44 assists to six different hitters. 

“Sky was just distributing the ball,” Cabanting said on Engleman. “He distrubted the ball evenly so the defense on the other side couldn’t key in on one player. He just kept Leilehua guessing to where the set was going to go.” 

Also finishing with double-digit kills for Moanalua was Luuga Vailuu and Dustin Carrier, registering 11 and 10 respectively. 

Moanalua was also strong defensively, accumulating 11 blocks throughout the match. Karson Cruz led the way with his match-high five blocks.

Na Menehune won the first two sets handedly, using a couple of flurries to seize them early, 25-11 and 25-14. It also worth noting that Moanalua’s big runs in the first two sets came with Victor Zamudio serving. Zamudio finished with two service aces. 

With convincing wins in the first two sets, Moanalua look primed to win it with a sweep. However, Leilehua would not go down lightly, taking the third set, 25-19 to extend the match. 

“I think we didn’t really focus, we thought we had it in the bag,” said Matautia. 

“Leilehua started to force a lot of high level play on us, we just didn’t know how to react to it,” Cabanting added. 

Though the fourth set was still competitive, Moanalua responded to win it, 25-16, and end the match. 

“We realized that if we needed a good seed in states, we needed to beat them,” said Matautia. 

Leading the Mules in the loss was Robin Ramelb who finished with 10 kills.

Leilehua will play in the opening round of the 2014 New City Nissan Division I Boys Volleyball Championships on Friday, May 2.