Kainoa Wade took off from behind the 3-meter line on the right side in front of the Hawaii bench and hammered the first kill of his career.
His father, Hawaii head coach Charlie Wade, put a little extra into his trademark fist pump watching his son realize a longtime dream.
A SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center crowd of 3,674 watched Kainoa Wade, who could have been preparing to make a run at a third straight state player of the year award at Kamehameha, instead look at ease in a UH uniform. He finished with eight kills over the final two sets of a 25-18, 25-17, 25-20 sweep of Harvard on Wednesday night.
Thirteen players found the court for the fourth-ranked Rainbow Warriors (3-0) against the Crimson (0-1).
The loudest ovations came in the second set when Louis Sakanoko was announced at outside hitter, followed by Kainoa Wade after a bit of a pause.
“He’s worked hard for a long time. He’s a good player and we knew we were going to get to this point,” Charlie Wade said. “It’s nice to be able to go to the bench and have a guy come off the bench and hit .500 and help you win. I’ve traveled all over the planet to recruit people and this one I didn’t have to leave the driveway.”
The 6-foot-10 opposite ended both sets he played with kills, including the final one on match point. He hit .533 for the match with no errors and assisted on two of Hawaii’s 11.5 blocks.
“It was a surreal experience for sure. I’ve been in the stands for 15 years now so to be on the court and see that first ball go down is something pretty special,” Kainoa Wade said. “It’s been a long time coming so to be able to show the fans and all the support I get from the state of Hawaii was something special.”
Charlie Wade said Kainoa was cleared by the NCAA just hours before the match. He replaced freshman Kristian Titriyski, who had two kills and two errors with an ace, a little earlier than anticipated.
“I thought earlier in the day maybe we would get him in the third set, but Kristian seemed to struggle a little bit and we needed a lift,” Charlie Wade said.
Adrien Roure put down a team-high nine kills and freshman middle Ofeck Hazan added six kills and six blocks and hit .600 for UH, which finished the match hitting .400.
Sophomore setter Tread Rosenthal had a match-high 33 assists, six digs, five blocks and one of five Hawaii aces.
Hazan, Kurt Nusterer and freshman middle Justin Todd, who played for Nusterer in the third set, combined for 11 kills in 19 swings with one error and one solo block with nine block assists.
“I think everyone is really young and they play really young and we’re trying to do really special things,” Hazan said. “We have really good attackers, really good setters and we can make it together.”
Roure, the reigning Big West Offensive Player of the Week, got off to another fast start with five kills in seven swings in the first set.
Both teams struggled from behind the service line early on, combining for 13 errors in the opening set.
The Crimson gifted the Rainbow Warriors 12 points on errors and hit just .160 while Hawaii opened with a .346 hitting clip to go up one set to none.
Hawaii increased that hitting mark to .452 in the second set with Kainoa Wade and Sakanoko substituting into the match.
Roure added four more kills and Sakanoko finished with two as Hawaii had only two hitting errors but six more serving errors.
Hawaii sided out 86.1% of the time to take a 2-0 lead entering the final set.
Freshman outside hitter Finn Kearney and Todd started the third set and both players served an ace within the first 10 points.
Hawaii finished the match on a 5-1 run.
“(Finn) is going to have an amazing career with us,” Charlie Wade said. “We have all of these guys when you’re just looking at moving pieces around and I thought Louis played well tonight too. It’s nice to get those guys out there and let them show what they can do.”
Harvard’s Logan Shepherd was match-high with 12 kills on 32 swings, but the Crimson struggled overall, hitting just .129 compared to .400 for Hawaii.
The teams play again Friday night at 7. The match will not be broadcast on Spectrum.
