PEARL HARBOR, Hawaii — Be it Big Three or Standard Six, the Moanalua boys volleyball team continues to find a way to get it done in the Oahu Interscholastic Association championships.
Na Menehune moved beyond last season’s talented troika of future University of Hawaii players and kept its public school dynasty intact with a well-balanced crew in a lengthy battle against Mililani, 25-19, 25-15, 27-29, 23-25, 15-10 on Wednesday night.
Moanalua made it five in a row OIA Division I titles dating back to 2018 and 11 of the last 12. Its 13 total titles (two in Division II) matched Pearl City (three in D-II) for the most all-time.
“Each practice we came with the mindset that we wanted to take this title this year. Even though we didn’t have the Big Three again … we still have great players,” said setter Manu Wilcox, who directed Na Menehune to a .341 hitting night with 56 assists, 11 digs and four kills.
Ezekiel Sablan put down 20 kills on .417 hitting, Jaycen Bush added 14 and D’Angelo Ross 13.
Afterward, Moanalua (14-0) learned it will be the No. 2 seed in the 12-team New City Nissan/HHSAA tournament, which begins on Monday. Ten-time defending state champion Punahou was granted the No. 1 seed. Big Island Interscholastic Federation champ Hilo is the No. 3 seed and Kamehameha-Maui will represent the Maui Interscholastic League as the No. 4 seed.
Preceding the Division I match, Waialua surged from behind to reverse sweep Kailua, 21-25, 22-25, 25-16, 25-22, 15-10.
Mililani (12-1), the only school to interrupt Moanalua’s streak of titles over the last decade-plus, threatened to make it back-to-back reverse sweeps after a sluggish start. The Trojans hit in the negative the first two sets.
Tyler Duranceau (20) and Aris Mateo (18) combined for the bulk of the Trojans’ kills. Duranceau had 13 attack errors but dug a match-high 14 balls.
“In a five-set match, you’ve always got a shot to come back but you’ve got to put everything on the court,” Trojans coach Gabriel Maunupau said. “In that third set, it was do or die and thank God that we responded. We did really, really well to get to that fifth set. But I think mental breakdowns here and there with defensive coverage, service errors, hitting errors, blocking assignments, that kind of stuff is just going to cost you, especially when it’s point for point, you know?”
Moanalua got swept by Mililani in a preseason scrimmage, when Na Menehune were still finding their footing after the graduations of Justin Todd, Kai Rodriguez and Zack Yewchuk.
For the OIA final, coach Alan Cabanting moved Sablan from middle to outside hitter and Trevor Kwak (nine kills) from middle to opposite. Luke Jones became a presence in the middle late in the season.
“As we did last year, we had to figure out where everybody belonged,” said Cabanting, who won his 10th boys title. “It was a fierce competition as to where everybody needed to be. And because this group is so close, they didn’t care who it was and they were just going to support whoever was in there. I think that’s a remnant from what happened last year in terms of the three boys being able to keep the team together and making it a special thing for them.”
Cabanting called timeouts on consecutive points late in Set 5 to make sure his players’ nerves were steadied. Service errors (15) were among the self-inflicted errors he tried to coax them to minimize.
Both teams frequently had to play unpredictable balls that were dug into the low roof at Radford’s James Alegre Gymnasium.
Wilcox had a ball that should’ve sailed into the stands bounce back to him off a raised basketball stanchion, and Na Menehune won the point.
“Oh, it’s tough, man,” Wilcox said. “It hits the roof, it can go anywhere. It can go straight down, it can curve a little bit. It’s crazy.”
Dayton Quick and the Waialua Bulldogs have a boys volleyball banner to call their own.
The expressive Waialua middle came close to a triple-double with nine kills, nine digs and seven blocks as the Bulldogs stunned Kailua in five sets for the first title in school history.
“We’re Waialua. No one expects Waialua to be here,” Quick said. “I came in here for that banner to have hung up in my gym, with my teammates and our year on it. That’s all I came here for.”
Jaris Ablao put down 13 kills, Keoni Nahoopii 12 and Shayne Kelly 11.
Coach Jerry Keola, a former Leilehua coach, kept things together on the sideline when the Surfriders jumped out 2-0 after two reasonably competitive sets.
“They definitely brought the best out of us, especially two games straight,” Keola said. “Hat’s off to ‘em, big time. We knew we had to dig in deep. When we took that third set, we knew we had to get one more, and then after that we knew it was ours.”
Waialua scored the first nine points of Set 4 and the first five of Set 5.
Caleb Kui led Kailua with 22 kills, 12 digs and five blocks.
Brian McInnis covers the state's sports scene for Spectrum News Hawaii. He can be reached at brian.mcinnis@charter.com.
