The Trojans celebrate a point against Campbell in an OIA Western Division contest Thursday night. Steve Erler | SL

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MILILANI — The score was closer than it would have liked it, but the Mililani boys volleyball team found a way to get it done to remain unbeaten atop the league standings Thursday night.

The Trojans staved off a energized Campbell team that was coming off its first loss of the season for a 25-21, 25-18 win to improve to 7-0 in Oahu Interscholastic Association Western Division play.

Three-year varsity senior Sila Fuiava led the way with nine kills, 11 digs and two aces to help Mililani extend its regular season-match winning streak to 23.

Junior outside hitter Nathaniel Johnson added six kills and two solo blocks and setter sophomore Chance Guillermo had four kills with 17 assists to round out the Trojans' top contributors. Players with kills for Mililani include Samuel Palompo, Brandon Rabang, Andrew Valladares and Trey Camello. Senior libero Jake Lafata also had a big game with a match-high 15 digs.

Campbell (6-2), who was coming off a straight set loss to Waipahu on Tuesday, was led by Ryan Cabanilla's five kills and 6-foot-4 junior Micah Anguay's four kills, two blocks and nine digs.

First-year Mililani coach Trenton Niino was happy with his team's ability to execute its game plan, but he knew his team could have play a lot better against the Sabers.

"Hats off to Campbell, they had a big gun in the middle with Micah and our game plan was to shut him down and get the entire team out of system, serve tough, hit tough so that they couldn't get a good pass to run the middle and I think we did pretty good at that," said Niino.

"However, I still don't think our boys played their best match," Niino continued. "I've been stressing to the boys that when you get on the court, you do business and you get off, and I think they didn't do that. I think we have a lot of work to do."

Campbell got the jump on Mililani early in the first set with an ace Jacob Wessling that rolled off the net and fell into the middle of the Trojans' court. Wessling followed this up with another ace down the line into the back left corner to give Campbell an early 2-0 lead.

Guillermo admitted that the Trojans, who beat Waipahu in straight sets last Thursday, may have overlooked the Sabers since they lost to a team that Mililani handled.

"The first ace I think that too us out of it, and I felt like we didn't come into this game with the correct mentality," he said. "We came in and thought ‘oh yeah, they already have that loss so we can beat them. Waipahu beat them and we beat Waipahu so we can beat them.' I think we have to come in with a better mentality than that."

The slow start by the Trojans resulted in a back-and-forth contest that featured multiple long rallies and 11 ties in the first set alone. Campbell coach Tracie Huddy Balino said that her team's first loss of the season allowed the Sabers to play more loose against Mililani.

"I just wanted them to go out there and have fun," she said. "After that loss with Waipahu, just that feeling of having a loss made them humbled. We knew our last four games was probably going to be our toughest games so we just needed to play, have fun and just play."

While the Sabers were playing with nothing to lose, the pressure was on the Trojans who let Campbell hang around. Instead of trying to stop the Sabers' momentum with an early timeout, Niino delayed calling a timeout as a teaching moment for his team, waiting until the Sabers were up 18-15.

"I don't believe in calling timeouts too quickly or too early," he said. "I like to let the boys have to fight for themselves and stick up for themselves and work as a team to get out of the hole that they got in."

After the timeout, it was all Mililani till the end of the set. The Trojans went on a 10-3 run, which included the last four points of the set, to take set one, 25-21. Fuiava and Gulliermo was key in the stretch run, with Fuiava getting kills to give Mililani a 22-21 lead and the set-clinching point while Guillermo had back-to-back kills on a joust and a dump to take the Trojans into set point.

Guillermo credited Fuiava's leadership in helping the Trojans gut out a tough game one.

"I look up to Sila as a role model because he gives a lot of leadership to me as a captain," he said. "He's like the dad of our team telling us what to do and all that. I think he really helped us pull through with this win."

Mililani rebounded in the second set and pulled away from the Sabers to take a commanding 21-10 lead.

"Second set we were doing pretty good," said Fuiava. "We tried to keep our energy as high as we can as high as possible because that's what keeps our team drive, it's our motivation on the court."

However, the Trojans failed to maintain the intensity and allowed the Sabers to battle back to make the score respectable in the end, 25-18.

"The second set we started off strong, however we didn't finish strong," said Niino. "I think the score should have been a lot different in my humble opinion and I think the boys got lax in the end."

For Campbell, Thursday's match proved that the Sabers can play at a high level against the top team in the division. Huddy Balino is hoping that her team can maintain its level of play when they take on Waianae (5-2) and Kapolei (6-1) to close out the regular season.

"I think we'll be ready," she said. "If we can play like this against them on any given day, I think we'll have a chance."