Box Score Box Score

HONOLULU - The No. 13 University of Hawai`i Rainbow Wahine volleyball team (1-0) opened their 2004 campaign with a 30-23, 30-15, 30-20 sweep of the Eastern Washington Eagles (0-1) in front of a crowd of 5,857 in the 17th Hawaiian Airlines Wahine Classic Thursday.

On a team loaded with youth, senior Melody Eckmier started her final season with a record-breaking performance, hitting .900 (nine kills, no errors, 10 swings) while adding a match-high seven blocks. Her .900 hitting percentage was the highest in the Rainbow Wahine record books for a single-match in the rally-scoring era.

Junior transfer Victoria Prince also came up big for the Rainbow Wahine, knocking in eight kills, four blocks, four aces and four digs while hitting .500. Alicia Arnott had a match-high 11 kills, eight digs and four blocks, while Kanoe Kamana`o added 37 assists, 10 digs and five blocks. Libero Ashley Watanabe had a team-high 14 digs, while Tara Hittle came off the bench to hit .667 (four kills, no errors, six attempts) in just over one game.

Hawai`i outblocked the Eagles 16.5 to 3, while outhitting them .312 to .082. The win marked the third-straight year that UH swept their season-opener.

The Rainbow Wahine opened the match serving notice that the net was their territory as Eckmier put away three blocks in the first six UH points, pushing Hawai`i to a 6-2 lead. EWU faught their way back into the match at 11-9 before the Rainbow Wahine went on a big 5-0 run on the serve of Kamana`o. Eastern Washington made a couple more pushes before they bowed out by a final of 30-23.

The second game started on a sad note for UH as freshman middle hitter Juliana Sanders went down with an injury to her left ankle after the first two points of the game. Sanders will get X-rays on her ankle tomorrow to see the severity of the injury.

But despite the setback, the Rainbow Wahine continued to roll, taking leads of 6-1 and 12-4 before slamming the Eagles 30-15 in game two.

Looking to finish their sweep, the Rainbow Wahine jumped out to a 12-8 lead on Prince's tough jump serve and never really looked back, Prince would have two of her four aces in the final game while Hittle provided a spark offensively, putting away four kills on six attempts in the game to push Hawai`i to a 30-20 victory in game three.

The Rainbow Wahine will next host San Diego tomorrow at approximately 7 p.m. at the Stan Sheriff Center in the second day of the HAL Wahine Classic. The match will be preceeded by a match between No. 17 Arizona and Eastern Washington, starting at 5 p.m.

match statistics

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