It’s no secret that at 7,220 feet, the University of Wyoming is located at the highest altitude of any Division I college school with a football team.
Hawaii women’s volleyball coach Joshua Walker had never been to Wyoming until the team arrived late Tuesday night after more than 14 hours and three plane rides since leaving campus.
Both players and coach knew the questions of altitude were coming before the team left campus. For all of them, it wasn’t nearly that big of a deal.
“We know there is altitude. We know the air is going to be dry. We know it’s going to be colder,” Walker said Monday. “We’re going to do things to make sure that we’re going to be prepared for that environment. We can’t make too much out of it because you’ve still got to go out there and play volleyball. It’s not anything we know we can’t overcome. It’s just things we have to mentally prepare for so we can put our best foot forward.”
The Rainbow Wahine (14-3, 6-0 Mountain West) are in firm control of the top spot in conference play after a wacky weekend that saw two of the top contenders lose twice.
Hawaii takes on Wyoming (10-7, 3-3), which won both matches against Air Force in a home-and-home setting.
With UC Davis and UTEP losing twice, only three schools have winning records in conference play. The Aggies are 4-2 after losing twice to New Mexico, which is also 4-2 after getting swept by Hawaii twice to start conference play.
The Rainbow Wahine have won six consecutive matches by sweep for the first time since 2016 and have equaled the best 17-match start to a season since 2019.
“Yes, we are at the top right now, so like everybody wants to beat us, everyone wants to win, so I think the competition is going to be super good for us,” Hawaii sophomore hitter Cha’lei Reid said. “We’re super excited as each game goes by and we’re just hungry that bad and wanting to get after it.”
Reid put down double figures in kills against San Jose State in back-to-back matches for the first time since the opening tournament of the season before she sat out eight matches with a shoulder injury.
The team’s leading returner in kills, Reid played both matches on the left side filling in for Tali Hakas, who remains day-to-day with a lower leg injury suffered prior to Friday’s match.
Sophomore Maeli Cormier, who played on the right side alongside Reid in both matches, had two of her best matches, combining for 18 kills in 27 swings with two errors.
Reid has played significantly better offensively on the left side, but with Hakas and Panna Ratkai healthy, is trying to stay on the floor producing the best she can on the right.
“Just working with Coach Josh, I think he wanted to relieve some pressure from last year and coming into my sophomore year from my freshman year, it has kind of evened out,” Reid said. “We have so much depth on this team that there is just so much players that can do everything, so it’s been super more relaxed in a way.”
With essentially four capable starting pin hitters, Walker has the luxury to move players around and figure out who is playing the best on any given night.
At the same time, he knows Reid and her individual talent is difficult to keep off the floor.
“She’s the hardest on herself. She wants to represent the state at a high level, she wants to represent her family, everything that means so much to her, at a very high level,” Walker said. “She puts so much pressure on that part of it so for her it’s not worrying about what happens at the end, but not she wants to score, but how she wants to score. How she is able to manage each opportunity to match that one chance and then how she is able to manage and maximize that one chance. When she didn’t play for that month, that is what we were doing in practice. She was so much a maximum attacker last year, it’s figuring out how to be a more efficient attacker.”
Hawaii entered the week ranked No. 39 in the second NCAA Division I women’s volleyball RPI rankings.
UH is holding opponents to a .141 hitting percentage, which is the fourth-best mark in the country.
Hawaii has held 14 opponents, including the last 11, to a hitting percentage less than .200.
The Rainbow Wahine have never lost to the Cowgirls in 10 all-time meetings. UH is playing in Laramie for the first time since 1996 when both schools were in the Western Athletic Conference.
“Defensively we have done pretty good,” Walker said. “There are some other parts of our game that have been pretty consistent and good. As far as where we want to go, and how far we want to get, we are not there yet, so it’s easy for them to kind of focus and dial in on working hard to reach those benchmarks that aren’t determined just based off who we are playing.”
RAINBOW WAHINE VOLLEYBALL
At UniWyo Sports Complex, Laramie, Wyo.
Hawaii (14-3, 6-0 Mountain West Conference) vs. Wyoming (10-7, 3-3)
>> When: Today and Saturday, 2:30 p.m.
>> TV: MW+
>> Radio: 1500-AM / 92.7 FM (Today); 1420-AM (Saturday)