UC Irvine sweeps Hawaii in Big West semifinals

One of the greatest multi-year runs in University of Hawaii sports history ended today, as UC Irvine knocked UH out of the Outrigger Big West Men’s Volleyball Championship tournament in a semifinal match at SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center.

After falling to the Anteaters 26-24, 36-34, 25-15, the Warriors are done for the year. They will not play in the NCAA Tournament — which they won in 2021 and 2022 and finished as runner-up in 2019 and last year — for the first time in five years.

UH won the last two Big West championships, but that crown and an automatic NCAA berth will now go to the winner of Saturday’s championship match between No. 2 seed UC Irvine and No.1-ranked and top-seeded Long Beach State.

The Warriors, who never recovered after losing star hitter Spyros Chakas for the season to injury on the eve of Big West play, finished 23-7. Irvine is now 19-9 after beating Hawaii for the second time in four matches this season.

A disastrous end to the second set did in the Warriors today.

>> PHOTOS: Hawaii vs. UCI

Hawaii was on the brink of evening the match at a set apiece, leading 24-21. But Irvine survived three set points to bring it to deuce — for the first of 11 times in the set — before the Anteaters finally took it with back-to-back kills by Hillir Henno. He totaled 20 of his match-high 24 kills in the first two sets.

The Anteaters won the first set despite a 7-1 deficit to start the match. Kurt Nusterer’s two aces and a block paced Hawaii’s early surge. Akhil Tangutur fueled a comeback with two kills to make it 8-7, but Hawaii never trailed until a Henno kill gave Irvine a 24-23 lead. Three points later, the Anteaters won the set with a block by Henno, Maxim Grigoriev and former Warrior libero and current Anteater setter Brett Sheward.

Hawaii never led the final set after going up 3-2 on a Louis Sakanako kill. Sakanako led the Warriors with 12 kills and Keoni Thiim had 11.

Long Beach State advanced to Saturday’s final by beating CSUN in four sets in today’s first semifinal.