USC
Hawaii
No. 2 Hawai'i Men's Volleyball Sweeps USC
March 01, 2002 | Men's Volleyball
March 1, 2002
LOS ANGELES - Costas Theocharidis had a match-high 21 kills and served 9 aces to lead the No. 2-ranked Hawaii men's volleyball team to a 30-13, 32-30, 30-26 win over USC in a Mountain Pacific Sports Federation contest on Friday (March 1) in the USC North Gym.
Hawaii improved to 11-3 overall and 8-1 in the MPSF, while the Trojans dropped to 5-15 (their slowest start ever) and 2-11 in the MPSF.
Theocharidis hit .613 to lead a Rainbow team that hit .400 for the match. Teammate Dejan Miladinovic hit a match-best .778 while getting 7 kills and a match-leading 6 blocks, while Jose Delgado had 7 kills while hitting .455.
For USC, Brook Billings had 12 kills and 5 digs and Beau Rawi added 9 kills.. The Trojans hit only .209 overall.
The first game was tied at 9-9 before Hawaii steamrolled the Trojans with the help of 4 Theocharidis aces and a .529 hitting mark (USC hit -.190 for the game).
Troy held an 18-15 lead in the second game and then, after the Rainbows tied it at 20-20 and again at 27-27, USC served for the game at 29-28, but Hawaii held. A pair of Delgado kills closed out the game.
The third game was knotted at 19-19 before the Rainbows pulled away. A Trojan hitting error ended the match.
The teams meet in a rematch on Saturday (March 2) at 7 p.m. in the USC North Gym.
