Officially, there was only one winner in Friday night's thrilling Oahu Interscholastic Association Division I girls volleyball championship match between Moanalua and Kapolei.

Na Menehune kept their perfect season intact with a five-set win over the upset-minded Hurricanes, but as the head coaches of both teams concurred after the final whistle, both teams needed the test of will that the match provided.

"I think this match — even though we lost — will still benefit us because none of our players had been in a championship match before," Kapolei coach Naidah Gamurot said. "Now they know what it feels like. They had to learn to relax and play through it and that's what they did, so that's good."

As for Moanalua, prior to Friday, it had dropped only one set all season and had yet to play more than three games in a single match.

"Every practice my assistant coaches are asking if we can go find matches, questioning whether our health and our physical fitness would allow us to go through and go five sets," Moanalua coach Alan Cabanting said. "I think today it helped us a lot because we now know that we can actually still attack in the fifth set."

One of Moanalua's top players agreed that Kapolei provided a stern test and well-timed tune-up for the upcoming state tournament.

"This game pushed us to our limit, so now we know we can do this and we've just got to keep building upon that success," said Na Menehune junior outside hitter Jojo Kruize, who put down a match-high 20 kills against the Hurricanes.

Moanalua cruised to a 2-0 lead in the best-of-5 match with a 25-16 win in game 1 and 25-20 in game 2. However, Kapolei turned the tables in games 3 and 4 — which it won 25-20 and 25-23, respectively — to force a fifth set.

"I think we were too ahead of ourselves," said senior outside hitter/middle blocker Lia Gaogao, who had 16 kills Friday. "We thought we had it and then they came back strong and then fortunately we got it at the end."

Gaogao and Kruize combined for seven of Moanalua's eight kills in the final game,

"I just think mentally we kind of started shutting down a little bit and getting on ourselves, but then when our coaches said, 'We got this, we believe in you guys,'  we decided that this was our game," said Kruize, who took matters into her own hands. "I wanted that ball. I knew I was a little shaky in the third and fourth set, but I was like, 'Give me that ball. I'm going to help you guys get this win right here.' "

Na Menehune won the fifth set, 15-13, to capture their third league title in school history, but first under Cabanting.

"I've got to give it up to all the girls," Cabanting said. "They bought into the program and they took care of their responsibilities, both on and off the court, so a lot of credit to the girls for not only taking care of that, but coming together and playing like a team."

The New City Nissan/Hawaii High School Athletic Association Division I State Championships gets underway Friday.