Hawai’i accelerates to national title over UC Irvine, completes climb to coronation

The journey connects back to July 2022.

The University of Hawai’i just wrapped up back-to-back national championship victories behind all-time program great Jakob Thelle, and head coach Charlie Wade had secured the heir to the star setter’s throne with the commitment of a 6-foot-7 high schooler by the name of Tread Rosenthal.

“He said – Coach, let’s do this. I’m going to come there and we’re going to win championships together,” Wade recounted of junior national team setter’s commitment call back in 2022.

Hawai’i went on to win a then-program-record 29 matches in 2023 but came up short of becoming the second program to ever complete a national championship three-peat as they fell in four frames in the final against UCLA in Fairfax, Virginia to cap off Thelle’s senior campaign.

Rosenthal grew an inch taller and reclassified, joining Hawai’i early ahead of the 2024 season as a 17-year-old with a beat on the starting setter position for a national title contender. A young Frenchman named Louis Sakanoko stood alongside him as the Rainbow Warriors reloaded with a talented but youthful recruiting class.

They had just one goal: return Hawai’i to the top of the college volleyball mountain.

That extended climb back to the summit wrapped up three seasons later in Los Angeles, seeing Hawai’i (30-5) shake off a nightmare start for a four-set victory over Big West rival UC Irvine (21-9) in the 2026 NCAA Men’s Volleyball Championship on Monday night, (15-25, 25-18, 25-18, 25-20).

Tread Rosenthal celebrates after a point during the 2026 NCAA Men’s Volleyball Championship against UC Irvine. | Photo Credit: Brian Bautista

Rosenthal, who played through a groin injury suffered late in UH’s semifinal victory over Long Beach State, racked up 44 assists, six digs, three blocks and three kills and served as the emotional spark for the Rainbow Warriors after a sloppy opening frame on the way to earning all-tournament team honors.

“I think we’re just a more mature team this year,” said the junior after Hawai’i’s return to the top. “You saw that exact same first set last year against UCLA and we couldn’t come back from it … You saw a different team this year, just understand that we’re okay and we’ve got three more sets of volleyball that we can win.”

Sakanoko, who revealed after the victory that he’d suffered a torn ligament in the regional final round against USC and played through the pain, was named the NCAA Tournament MVP following his 12-kill, three-ace performance on .500 hitting in the championship match. A run of three consecutive aces from Sakanoko put the Rainbow Warriors ahead for good in the fourth set, finishing off a tidal wave performance by Hawai’i’s team to claim the title.

Hawaii OH Louis Sakanoko places Hawai’i’s name on the champion spot for the 2026 NCAA Men’s Volleyball Tournament bracket. | Photo Credit: Brian Bautista

It was not a completely perfect script for UH. They committed seven attacking errors and had five more miscues from behind the service line in a disaster first set on Monday against the Anteaters, folding for a 10-point thrashing in the first game of the best-of-five national championship.

Rosenthal helped awaken the sleepwalking Rainbow Warriors, hammering home a couple of overpasses from UCI in the follow-up frame as UH raced out to a 10-5 advantage in the second set.

Sophomore standouts Adrien Roure and Kristian Titriyski powered up, totaling nine kills each by the end of the encore frame to help Hawai’i even the match and make the national championship into a best-of-three series. Roure finished the night with 15 kills, just behind Titriyski (16) for Hawai’i’s highest output.

UCI and UH wrestled through the opening 20 points of the third, seeing the Rainbow Warriors snag an 11-9 lead to force an early timeout from the Anteaters in the swing frame.

Hawai’i stayed hot through the stoppage, swinging at a .458 clip in the third set to take a 2-1 advantage over UC Irvine and place themselves on the doorstep of the program’s third national title.

The Rainbow Warriors capped off the climb to a collegiate men’s volleyball coronation with their best set of the evening, hitting a match-high .538 as a team to bury the Anteaters’ hopes of a storybook finish from last-team-in to last-team-standing.

Titriyski’s 16 kills led all players for either team, also seeing a pair of UH’s nine service aces come off the powerful right-handed swing from the Bulgarian as he earned all-tournament team honors alongside Rosenthal.

Middle blockers Justin Todd and Trevell Jordan combined for 12 kills and only two errors on 17 swings, providing a steady presence for the freight train of momentum that helped carry UH towards the title.

Monday marked an alignment of stars, both cosmically and on the court, for UH. With Rosenthal approaching the final pages in the Rainbow Warrior chapter of his career, he finally got the chance to make good on his phoned promise to Wade nearly four years ago.

There were plenty of bumps and bruises along the way, but life has a funny way of foreshadowing.

His freshman campaign came crashing down in mid-March when star outside hitter Spyros Chakas tore his ACL in the finale of the 2024 OUTRIGGER Invitational.

Hawai’i’s opponent? The Anteaters.

UC Irvine again stood in the way when the 2024 Big West Tournament came around, mercifully ending the season of the wounded Rainbow Warriors in the conference semifinals.

It sent Rosenthal’s iteration of the program back to the drawing board with an entirely new cast of faces from the last national title team, now forced to figure out the return path to the podium.

Rosenthal and the Rainbow Warriors broke back through in 2025, capturing the crown in the Big West Championship with four-set finishes against both UCI and Long Beach State in front of a pair of packed houses inside the Stan Sheriff Center.

Returning to the national tournament, Hawai’i handled Penn State in the 2025 national quarterfinal round before UCLA sent them home from Ohio to Oahu without any more hardware with a loss in the national semifinal.

When you look back at the lead-up, was there really any other way the fairytale to end?

Inside the home of the team that knocked out last year’s Rainbow Warrior squad, the 2026 version of Hawai’i happily earned the right to hang another banner in Mānoa with a full-circle finish against the program that pushed them into a championship rebirth.

So don’t be afraid savor it, soak it in like the sunshine.

Hawai’i’s team stands alone amongst them all.