Kamehameha's Kealani Browne puts down a kill attempt against Waiakea. Peter Caldwell | SL

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SALT LAKE — Top seeded Kamehameha-Kapalama rolled past Waiakea in three sets, 25-11, 25-18, 25-23 to advance to the semifinals of the New City Nissan/Hawaii High School Athletic Association Girls Division I Volleyball State Championships at Moanalua High School on Saturday night. 

"With all the stuff that happened, we pushed through and we have a lot of depth so any person can go in their and do their job and do it well. They push really hard and work for each and everyone on the team. We're doing this for each other," said setter Leila Holt. 

"Our team is great from top to bottom and it's been a while since we had five days of work in our gym. A lot of it has been broken up by games, but we got to work on a lot of things in the past week and the girls did a lot of things and did a great job executing. Waiakea is a great team with a lot of athletic players from top to bottom. We knew they were going to fight, come game three, we were proud of our girls to contribute and come out with a close ‘W' in set three," said Kamehameha coach Chris Blake.

Holt led all players with 33 assists and four aces, Tiyana Hallums had a game-high 12 kills and 12 digs. Holt stepped up big in the absence of setter Kamalani Akeo, who suffered an injury against Punahou last week. 

"Every picked up their game and there is no doubt in anyone's mind that we are doing our best and pushing through. We are playing and winning this for her," said Holt. 

"No words can explain how proud I am of Leila. Everyone was a bit nervous that she's a new setter that we had to adjust to her or she has to adjust to us. But she came in here and killed it and the depth was really showed today," said Hallums.

"What we do in our gym and our players know and understand their roles and responsibilities and Kama is a great player, but when everyone else had to step up, it takes more than one player to do those kinds of things and our team made a decision to step up and play together and do some good things tonight," said Blake.

Waiakea was down two sets to Mililani last night, but persevered and came out on top after five sets and that caught Kamehameha's attention. 

"We could not sleep on them, at all. We can't be complacent as you can see with Mililani, you are never safe until that end whistle and we had to make sure we closed the game," said Hallums.

"Knowing what they could do. We worked on our scheming and executed well in games one and two. In game three they made changes and they played better, we didn't play as good. We found a way, from top to bottom and did a great job executing to end the game and pull out a win," said Blake.

In the first set, Kamehameha jumped out to a 6-1 lead and extended the lead to double digits after Tiyana Hallums' ace to make it, 19-7. Leila Holt had 10 assists and set her teammates up for kills to get the Warriors going. Kamehameha was able to pull away from Waiakea to win, 25-11. 

"It starts with first pass. Our passers were doing really well in the first two sets and they were getting the ball to the spots and nothing was dropping to the floor, it was making it easier for the setters and the hitters to attack," said Holt.

Waiakea took a brief, 5-4 lead in the second set after Kamehameha hit it out. However, the Warriors were able to use a 4-1 run and created separation after Kayla Afoa landed a kill to make it 18-11 and Waiakea called timeout. Waiakea cut it to four after Kayla Kahauolopua's kill. However, Kamehameha used a 6-1 run to end the set. Hallums nailed six of her 12 kills in the set and Shiloh Pelaras added all four of her kills. 

"I feel like we were playing as a team and came together and talking was a huge deal and we did that well," said Hallums. 

Holt had two service aces to start the third set, and her fourth ace made it 14-8. Kamehameha was able to rotate some players in to get some game reps. There was no quit in Waiakea and they battled back and managed to tie the game at 18. Both teams traded points and Waiakea took their first lead of the set, 21-20 after a block from Kahauolopua. The game was tied at 22 before Kamehameha added kills from Brooke Kaawa and Hallums and Waiakea failed to get the ball over to end the match.  

"We had to make sure we weren't too jumpy or overthink things and trust each other and make sure we came out with that win," said Hallums. 

"We all come together, we got into rough spots, but we pushed and make sure we finish this fight and we're going to fight no matter what," said Holt. 

The Warriors advance to play Kapolei next week at McKinley's Student Council Gymnasium at 5 pm. 

"It sounds generic, our strength of our team. We believe in each other and we do a lot of the little things to come out successful and I thought we did a lot of those tonight. When you're playing at this time of the year you have to bring your best match, Waiakea, I believe we got their best match and I believe we bring the best out of everybody so we have to be ready to step up and do great things next week," said Blake. 

Moanalua sweeps Kahuku in three sets

Moanalua swept Kahuku, 25-21, 25-13, 25-22 in the quarterfinals of the New City Nissan/Hawaii High School Athletic Association Division I Girls Volleyball State Championships at Moanalua High School on Saturday night. 

Moanalua will play the Interscholastic League of Honolulu runner-up, Punahou next week Friday at McKinley's Student Council Gymnasium at 7 pm. 

The Na Menehune battled through the first set, winning 25-21 and pulled away in the second set, winning by double-digits, 25-13. 

JoJo Kruize led the Na Menehune with 15 kills, Lia Gagogao had 14 kills and eight digs, Bry Yasui had 20 assists and two aces, Emree Sato had 16 assists, and Lindsey Ng had a team-high 11 digs.

The Red Raiders gave everything they had and trailed throughout the third set but they cut the deficit to 1 several times. Lia Gaogao had a pair of kills to help Moanalua pull away at the end.  

Cheyenne Teo led Kahuku with eight kills, Carey Williams added seven kills, ShaRae Niu had 24 assists and Rachel Blake had 14 digs.