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Phoebe Grace is here for her team, in whatever capacity that may be.

The 2017 Kahuku graduate and Laie native is in her fifth year on the University of Utah women's volleyball team and she's hoping this one will be the best one yet.

The Utes (2-0) are ranked 19th in this week's American Volleyball Coaches Association Top 25 poll and are coming off of two wins over Utah Valley last weekend.

Staying put at 1⃣9⃣ this week heading into the Utah Classic! pic.twitter.com/Gt7X5ncTKF

— Utah Volleyball (@UtahVolleyball) August 30, 2021

Utah opened its season with a four-set win over the Wolverines in Orem, Utah Friday, before coming away with a sweep at home in Saturday's rematch.

"Both of those matches were really good as a team, so I'm thinking it's looking pretty good for us so far," said Grace, a 6-foot-2 middle blocker. "Our chemistry's looking good, everything — offense, defense — everything's looking promising, so it's pretty exciting."

In her Utes' career, Grace has played in 80 matches and 297 sets. After redshirting in 2017, she started 23 matches as a freshman in 2018, when she totaled 159 kills and registered a team-high 117 blocks, including a career-high 11 blocks against Montana. The following season she played in every match, finished second on the team with 158 blocks (1.21 per set) and totaled 105 kills.

During the COVID-affected 2020 season, Grace started all 18 matches and played in all but two of her team's 66 sets. She had at least one block in every match, including 11 against Colorado to match her career high. Grace racked up 77 kills and again led the Utes with 67 blocks.

This fall, however, has been a bit of a different story so far. Grace did not play in Friday's match and entered Saturday's contest late in the second set. She put away both of her attempts for kills and contributed on a couple of blocks to tally three points in limited action.

Grace isn't worrying about what — through the first weekend of the season, anyway — appears to be a diminished role.

"I don't really think it's any specific reason, just that we have a really talented team this year," she said when asked if she was working her way back from an injury.

However big or small of a role she plays, Grace harbors no hard feelings about the situation.

"We have a lot of talented middles so playing time is a little tough right now, but regardless of that, I'm just supporting the team and hoping for the best and probably one of the biggest things right now is being a team player and just doing our best," she expressed.

The Utes' non-conference schedule continues this weekend, as they host the four-team Utah Classic, which includes the University of Hawaii.

When the teams meet in Salt Lake City Saturday at the 15,000-seat Jon M. Huntsman Center, it will mark the first time that Grace will get to play against the Rainbow Wahine (2-1), whom she grew up rooting for.

"I think, first, it's going to be really exciting getting to finally play against UH. I feel like that's almost every girl that plays volleyball's dream is to play UH at one point in their career, so I'm definitely excited and I'm also very excited for my team because UH is a fantastic team — they're super aggressive, scrappy, they're very athletic — and I'm very excited to see the matchup that we have against them," said Grace, who is the only player from the 50th state on the Utah roster.

The coaching staff, however, has a distinctly local touch. Director of Operations Sheldon Carvalho is from Kauai (his brother Sterling is Kahuku's football coach) and Wil Stanley, a 2016 Punahou graduate who went on to star at Brigham Young, is in his first season as a volunteer assistant.

"It's nice to have other people understand when my pidgin gets out of hand and no one knows what I'm saying," Grace laughed, "but Will does, because Will does it, too, sometimes, but it's fun, especially having Will this year. He's such an amazing player — three-time All-American, he's one of the best setters of all time — he's been such a good addition to our team."

But the Hawaii connections don't end there. Associate Head Coach Malia Shoji is the niece of longtime UH coach Dave Shoji. Also, assistant coach Dan Corotan's wife, Kanani, is from the 808 state.

"It's funny you bring that up because when we played Pepperdine in a preseason tournament in 2019, my mom had told me to ask the coaches if they want anything from Hawaii and then Dan said he wanted manapua, so of course, my mom (froze) a bunch of manapua, wrapped it in tin foil and brought it with her to Pepperdine and in the middle of the meeting I just see Dan lift the bag up and show us his manapua," Grace recalled. "He was like, ‘I got it!' and I was like, ‘nice, Dan,' but yeah, I think that's something that's been really fun and even Malia, everyone knows how legit the Shojis are and she's up to that title as well and Dan and Sheldon, all of them, I think that they've added so much to the team and I feel very lucky that I've been able to be coached by them."

Grace will also be reunited Saturday with a few familiar faces on UH's side of the net. Hawaii sophomore Braelyn Akana (Kamehameha '19) is also from the north shore of Oahu, specifically Hauula.

"I've known her for a long time," said Grace, who played for several clubs, including Imi Ike and Spike And Serve. Among those she counts as former club coaches are Rainbow Wahine head coach Robin Ah Mow and assistant Nick Castello.

The last time that Utah and UH met on the volleyball court was in 2017, when the Utes posted a four-set win over the Wahine on the final night of the Hawaiian Airlines Rainbow Wahine Invitational. Grace made the trip to Honolulu with the team, but did not play in the match as she was redshirting that season.

"It was very exciting," Grace remembers of the match, which was played before a crowd of 6,948 fans at the Stan Sheriff Center.

"It was almost funny, like, I had just left home and just a few months later I get to come back and play in the Stan Sheriff Center and it was special not only for me, but also for my teammates (who) were also from Hawaii," she said.

Those teammates were then-senior outside hitter Adora Anae (Kahuku '14) and then-sophomore setter Bailey Choy (Iolani '16).

"Adora went on to become a First Team All-American, Bailey was running our offense at the time — she was a star at Iolani back in the day — and just being able to see them just perform with all of our families and friends there and all of the aloha that we got from them was just very memorable," Grace reminisced.

Anae, being from the same community as Grace, was especially helpful in helping the latter overcome some homesickness.

"We were teammates in high school at Kahuku and it was fun to play with her again, especially since college and high school are just two completely different levels, yeah, it was really fun to play with her that one season, especially since she was just such a legend and she was just so amazing here at the U, it was so fantastic to be able to play a year with her," Grace said.

She went on to play with two others from Hawaii who were high school teammates of Choy's in setter Saige Kaahaaina-Torres (Iolani '17) and libero/defensive specialist Naya Dong ('19).

"Me and Saige used to play (club) together in high school as well, so we've known each other for a long time and getting the opportunity to play with her for three years of my collegiate career was also a good experience being with someone that I've known for so long, who ended up becoming a really good friend," Grace said.

However, after a decorated three-year career at Utah, Kaahaaina-Torres has transferred to the University of Texas.

"I think it was a great experience and I was grateful to have it and even though she's transferred to Texas, I think it's a really good opportunity for her and I wish nothing but the best for her," Grace expressed.

Utah has qualified for the NCAA Tournament in each of Grace's first four seasons there. During her redshirt campaign, the Utes reached the Sweet 16, before falling to Texas in five sets. The following season they were swept by rival BYU in the second round of the tournament. In 2019, they returned to the Sweet 16, only to lose to eventual-champion Stanford in five sets.

Last season, however, the Utes were picked as the favorite to win the Pac-12 Conference by the league's coaches for first time in program history. Ultimately, they finished third in the truncated spring season that saw five matches canceled due to COVID-19 protocols and saw an abrupt end to their season with a first-round exit in the NCAA Tournament with a sweep at the hands of Pittsburgh.

"I definitely think that loss to Pitt is something that's almost fueled our fire," Grace said. "None of us were happy with the way things ended, for us to end the tournament that way when we had so many high hopes and I think that's definitely something that's got us working extra hard in the gym and just more dedication, motivation to making sure that our team can be the best that they can this season right now."

Grace did not differentiate when asked if there is a team-wide goal for the Utes this season or an individual one for her.

"Honestly, the main goal is just to make it far in the tournament — just going really far in the tournament," she affirmed.

And no matter how much or little is asked of her, Grace is, to be sure, all in.

"I think I'm very supportive and encouraging of my teammates and as well as just being the best player I can be, I want to be the best teammate at the same time and just perform both on the court and off the court and just succeed as best as I can," she said.

As a senior at Kahuku, Grace was selected as Oahu Interscholastic Association Eastern Division Player of the Year and helped the Red Raiders to the 2016 Division I league crown.

"The glory days," Grace recalled. "I loved my time at Kahuku, of course, most people do. Even to this day, I still say that one of my favorite years ever of playing volleyball was my senior year at Kahuku High School. It was the last time that I was going to play with the best friends that I've had in my whole life and we had a really good season."

Kahuku compiled a perfect 14-0 record in league play that year and went on to reach the semifinals of the D1 state tournament. It finished in third place and with an overall record of 16-1.

"Even though the season fell a little short, I just felt so blessed to be able to be from such a strong-knit community, like the support that all the students get at Kahuku and I just feel so blessed to be from a community like that where they just love you so much and they're willing to support you in so many different ways and that's definitely something that I feel like I brought to college, was just that sense of family or community in a team, or almost in our athletic department," Grace said. "I feel that way about our team right now here at the U; all of my teammates I love them all so much, even our support staff — they're all fantastic and that's definitely something I feel like I got from my time at Kahuku."

Grace and the Utes will take on Cal Poly and San Diego on Friday before Saturday's showdown against Hawaii.

First serve is scheduled for 3 p.m. Hawaii time. The match, along with the Rainbow Wahine's other two matches on their road trip — at Utah Valley Thursday at 1 p.m. and Friday against San Diego at 8:30 a.m., both times Hawaii — will be broadcasted on either ESPN Honolulu or CBS Sports Radio AM 1500.