FULLERTON, Calif.—The University of Hawai'i women's volleyball team (13-6, 9-1 Big West) overpowered Cal State Fullerton on the road in a sweep, 25-3, 25-14, 25-13 at Titan Gym in Fullerton, Calif. on Saturday night. UH racked up a season-high 13 aces in the match—led by a career-high six aces by Faith Ma'afala alone.  

The win by Hawai'i, who remains second in the Big West at 9-1, sets up a huge rematch between the No. 12 Cal Poly Mustangs this Friday, Oct. 26 at the Stan Sheriff Center. The Mustangs remain unbeaten at 9-0 in conference and are now 19-1 overall and are off to its best start in program history. Friday's game is FREE YOUTH NIGHT and it is a "Whiteout" as fans are encouraged to wear white. Cal Poly defeated Hawa'i earlier this season in four sets in San Luis Obispo, Calif. The following night, UH will battle UC Santa Barbara on Saturday, Oct. 27. UH defeated the Gauchos on the road earlier this year in a tough five-set match.
 
Ma'afala also dished out a match-high 20 assists and had six digs for the night. Her six aces ties her with 11 other Rainbow Wahine for No. 5 in single-match service aces.
 
UH's two McKenna's led UH's offensive attack. McKenna Ross buried nine kills to lead UH, hitting a career-high .529 with zero errors in 17 attacks. She finished one kill shy of a double-double as she recorded a season-high 10 digs.
 
McKenna Granato added eight kills and hit a career-high .667. She was errorless in 12 swings. She also had four service aces and two digs.
 
Tita Akiu led the match with 19 digs and Skyler Williams and Angel Gaskin had two kills apiece to lead the 'Bows.
 
Ma'afala got the match going on a 17-to-0 run in which UH had seven kills, one block, five CSUF hitting errors and four straight service aces in the middle of the rally. Cal State Fullerton managed to score three-straight points behind the serving of Savahna Costello, but then Granato ended the set on a 7-0 serving run capped by an ace to end it at 25-3. UH only had two servers and the Titans had one in the entire set. It was the lowest opponent score since scoring was changed to 25 points in rally scoring.
 
The second set started out close. UH was leading just 6-5 before going on a seven-point scoring run—six of which came off the jump-serving of Norene Iosia.  After a couple of Titan points, Ross began a six-point serving run which was highlighted by back-to-back kills from rookie Trinity Castaneda—her first kills of her Rainbow Wahine career. Ross' run extended UH's lead to 21-8. CSUF ended the set on an 8-to-4 run, but the deficit was too much to overcome as UH went up 2-0 winning Set 2, 25-14.
 
The Titans raced out to a 5-1 lead in Set 3, but Hawai'i quickly erased CSUF's lead and tied it at 6-6 in the middle of another long Ma'afala serving run. She started serving with the Titans leading 6-4 and ended her 10-point run with a 12-6 lead. Rika Okino and Williams both went on multiple-point serving runs as UH pulled away to seal the sweep with a 25-13 win in Set 3.
 
The Titans Jayla Norman led her team with eight kills while Courtney Mueller had a team-high 15 assists.

Hawai'i out-hit the Titans, .333-to- -.011 and had 43 kills to CSUF's 16. But Cal State Fullerton out-blocked UH, 4.0-to-3.0. All 14 UH players got into the game by the middle of the second set.