HONOLULU—The University of Hawai'i women's volleyball team fell in its Spring Match to Pepperdine, 3-1. The Waves held off the Rainbow Wahine, 25-23, 18-25, 25-20, 26-24 on Friday night in front of a crowd of 1,091 at the SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center.
 
With UH shorthanded in the middle, Amber Igiede played the entire match in the front row at middle blocker. She was the iron woman on the court and racked up 31 kills in 52 attacks with a .500 hitting percentage in four sets. She also added seven digs and five blocks in her yeoman effort.
 
The rest of the 'Bows accounted for 26 kills—led by Mia Johnson who put down 11 kills and had four digs. Tayli Ikenaga recorded match-high 13 digs while the newest addition to the UH squad, junior transfer Talia Edmonds came up with seven digs and a service ace.
 
Setters Kate Lang and Mylana Byrd combined for 50 assists with Lange dishing out 31 and Byrd dealing out 19 assists. Lang also had a team-high four service aces and four digs.  
 
In the first set, the Waves led by as many as four early on at 13-9. But the 'Bows soon rallied to catch Pepperdine, at 16-16 on a 4-to-1 run. The Waves would end up edged out UH to take Set 1, 25-23.
 
In the second set, with Kate Lang serving, UH went on an 8-to-0 run to take a 16-6 lead that Pepperdine could not recover from. UH led by as many as eight points throughout the frame. Ilayda Demirtas, Kendra Ham and Mylana Byrd all came off the bench in Set 2 and contributed in the set win.
 
In the third set, UH struggled on serve receive as Pepperdine served five of its 13 aces in the match in Set 3 alone. The Waves pulled away to take a 2-1 match lead winning Set 3, 25-20.
 
With Ikenaga serving, Hawai'i went on a 7-to-0 run to lead 14-7 early in Set 4. But the Waves erased their deficit, catching UH at 18-18. From that point, the two teams were tied at 19, 20, 21, 22, 23 and 24 before Pepperdine was able to score the final two points to seal the win.

The Waves had three players with double-digit kills, led by Rachel Ahrens' 20 put-downs. Setter Isabel Zelaya had 52 assists while Kayleigh Hames had a team-high 10 digs. 
 
This was the only match the Rainbow Wahine will play in this Spring.