Kamehameha's Kayla Afoa winds up to make a kill attempt past Punahou's Mariah Rigg, left, and Kiani Tuileta, right. Sean Nakamura | SL

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Kamehameha outside hitter Tiyana Hallums makes a kill attempt against Punahou. Sean Nakamura | SL

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MAKIKI — Kayla Afoa registered a match-high nine kills and Tiyana Hallums added seven kills to lead Kamehameha to a straight-set win over Punahou in an Interscholastic League of Honolulu Division I match Tuesday night at Hemmeter Fieldhouse. The scores were 25-15 and 25-21.

The Warriors led for nearly the entirety of the match, which lasted just under an hour and was televised live statewide on OC16. Kamehameha improved to 7-0 in the ILH after having just returned from a tournament in Las Vegas Sunday night. The Buffanblu, who had more errors (21) than kills (15) for the match, lost for the second time this season to Kamehameha to fall to 6-2.

The Warriors also swept the first meeting at Kekuhaupio Gym back on Sept. 7 and are alone atop the ILH standings and appeared to further widen the gap with the Buffanblu Tuesday night.

"We know that Punahou is a really good team and they're our rival for a long time so just coming in here and playing as a team, we did what we needed to do," said Afoa, a 5-foot, 9-inch outside hitter. "It's just a great experience."

Kamehameha was sharp in all aspects Tuesday night, but especially on the defensive end.

"We tried to put a lot of pressure in terms of what they were doing, but really we played excellent defense," Warriors' coach Chris Blake said. "Maybe we frustrated them, I don't know — I doubt it — but we executed and did the little things and it ended being good for us."

Hallums, a 5-foot, 9-inch outside hitter/opposite put down six of her kills in the opening set to give Kamehameha the easy 25-15 win.

"Our outsides did a great job of playing. We typically try to run a balance attacked. Our outsides — both Tiyana and Kayla — did great things for us, but a lot of it was predicated on our block as well," Blake said. "It may not show up in the stats, but we did a lot of great things."

The teams exchanged points early in game two until Kamehameha used a 7-1 run to take a 15-10 lead. Punahou used a 6-1 run later in the set to pull within 23-20, but Kealani Browne and Alohi Robins-Hardy combined for a block to give their team match points and two plays later Afoa notched her final kill of the night to seal it for the Warriors.

"I was just in the groove," said Afoa, who had seven kills in the second game alone. "I was just expecting the ball to come to me. Our setter really pulled through and made the right decisions."

Punahou never really found a rhythm, committed costly unforced errors and failed to capitalize on Kamehameha's few miscues.

"We definitely committed a lot of errors on our end so we need to get back to the drawing board and fix that," Buffanblu interim coach Tanya Fuamatu-Anderson said. "A lot of that is mental errors, which is something that we've been talking about since the last time we met up with them. The kids just needs to figure out that you've got to do it when it's time to do it because they look great in practice and they ever so ready, but when the lights get turned on and the cameras get turned on, I think we're stressing ourselves out a little too much."

McKenna Granato led Punahou with five kills.

"Tough loss. Kamehameha played great like they did the first time we saw them," said Fuamatu-Anderson, whose team had won four straight since the first loss to the Warriors. "They're sharp. Their ball-control game definitely puts the gap between us and them right now."

Kamehameha showed no signs of fatigue despite playing seven matches in Las Vegas over the weekend. It finished second in the entire tournament, which included 64 teams.

"We did really good up there. We really held up as a team and we showed the mainland girls how we do it down here and we just came back," Afoa said. "We had some motivation because we came in second and it really pushed us to do good down here."

Kamehameha hosts Iolani while Punahou visits Mid-Pacific Saturday.