Mid-Pacific denies Damien in straight sets

The Owls celebrate match point before a full capacity crowd at Mills Gymnasium Tuesday night. Greg Yamamoto | SL

MANOA — The Mid-Pacific girls volleyball team was not going to let Damien claim the ILH Division II title on its home floor Tuesday night.

The Owls (12-2) handed the seventh-ranked ranked Monarchs (13-1) their first loss of the season with a straight set sweep at Mills Gymnasium in the league's second round final. Game scores were 25-19, 25-21, 25-21.

Kaehu Keala put down 15 kills with six total blocks and Emma Porter distributed 33 assists with four kills to help Mid-Pacific win a winner-take-all match at the Monarchs' gym on Thursday at 6 p.m. The victor will also lock up a first round bye in next week's New City Nissan D2 state tournament, which begins on Oct. 24.

Damien coach Don Faumuina, whose team beat the Owls in the first round, 25-17, 25-15, credited the adjustments done by Mid-Pacific coach Tommy Lake and Keala's performance.

"Tommy them did their homework on us," he said. "This is definitely a different team than what we saw from the beginning of the season. They made a lot of adjustments, and Kaehu was working the entire net, not just the middle."

In addition to having Keala attack all around the net, the Owls also moved from a 6-2 to a 5-1 offense with Porter directing the entire offense.

Lake said Keala and Porter's relationship on the floor has been a key factor in his team's rise. The Owls have won nine straight matches since their loss earlier season loss to Damien.

"(Keala) and Emma really started to groove about maybe a couple of weeks ago. They're finding a rhythm, which has helped us a lot. They know how to find each other so that's a good thing."

The Owls' second setter in their 6-2 offense, Alyssa Muraoka is also in a new role at libero, which moved incumbent Shyla Sato to an outside hitter spot. The lineup change paid dividends as Sato finished with six kills and 15 digs and Muraoka had 13 digs.

"Alyssa started out as being a setter, but she's such a good defensive player so we decided to take advantage of that because she's so good at middle back," said Lake.

On Sato playing outside hitter, Lake said: "Shyla, who's our starting libero through the last couple years, is also a consistent hitter. The thing with having her and Alyssa out there is like having two liberos on the court.

Amy Warrington added five kills, Kamalani Kekoolani had four - including match point - and Debi Chun chipped in three kills in the late stages of the last two sets to round out Mid-Pacific's top attackers.

The Monarchs' also utilized a 5-1 and had a new libero on the court, but that was more out of necessity than choice. An injury Rayne Pactol saw setter Elsa Radovan moved to libero with Kaulana Kalulu-Sugai directing the offense in the first two sets.

Radovan changed out of her libero jersey in the third set and spent time at setter in the last period of play, but the Monarchs could never get into a groove against the Owls as they committed 21 hitting errors on the night.

"I think the girls were not trusting themselves and the system and getting to the right position and they were being a little hesitant which was giving us a lot of struggles tonight...and just being safe and not being aggressive as I wanted them to," said Faumuiana.

Shelby Capllonch had 17 kills and 17 digs - both match-highs - to lead the Damien in the loss.

Reach Michael Lasquero at [email protected].