Maryknoll setter Jhenna Gabriel attempts a dump against the Raiders. Gabriel finished with 39 assists to lead the Spartans in straight sets. Greg Yamamoto | SL

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Maryknoll setter Jhenna Gabriel attempts a dump against the Raiders. Gabriel finished with 39 assists to lead the Spartans in straight sets. Greg Yamamoto | SL

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After a up-and-down first half of the season, Maryknoll is ready to turn the corner.

The Spartans began the second round of the Interscholastic League of Honolulu Division I season in an emotional straight set win over Iolani, 25-13, 27-25, 25-19 at Clarence T.C. Ching Gymnasium Saturday afternoon.

"This is what we have trained all year round for," said Maryknoll coach Luis Ramirez, who is in his first year back at Maryknoll. "We said that this young team is going to pick up steam in the second round. I think our kids train really hard, and as the season rolls on, the better they're going to get."

Maryknoll junior setter Jhenna Gabriel dished out 39 assists with four digs, three aces, two block and two kills to help the Spartans (5-6) avenge two losses to Iolani in the first round of league play.

"It feels great especially after we lost to them the first two matches," said Gabriel. "It's been pretty close games, especially our first one the last time we played them here. Just to pull through and play together, that was pretty awesome."

Senior outside hitter Natasha McClendon and Dakota Viena each had 14 kills and Rhyenne Filisi added 10 more to round out the Spartans with double-digit kills. Moana Tootoo and Isabella Cravens also contributed with six and four kills respectively. Libero Kiari Gier chipped in a match-high 17 digs with six assists to lead the back row.

The Raiders, who was coming off a win over defending state champion Kamehameha, dropped to 8-3 in the ILH D1 standings.

"They played better than us and we didn't play too well," said Iolani coach Kainoa Obrey. "I think they just played some good team ball and they ball-handled well enough to kind of mix it up and we didn't play too good. If you don't play well in our league, you lose and unfortunately we didn't play too well and they did."

The energy and passion in the match was evident in the ending of the second set and the duration of the third game as both teams continued to battle. Questionable calls got the best of Iolani in the final frame as a yellow card and red card was assessed on the Raiders' bench, with the latter giving Maryknoll a 23-19 advantage.

"I think every match in our league is high emotion," said Obrey. "I think everyone can beat each other so everyone feels like that, just got to keep battling."

Still, the Spartans still did their part in earning the victory.

Maryknoll trailed 24-21 in the second set, but rallied behind Gabriel's serving to take a 25-24 lead. After a service error lost the serve, the Spartans scored two straight points on a kill by Tootoo and an ace by McClendon to take a critical two games to none lead.

"I think that's just a show of the grit and determination that these girls had," said Ramirez. "Before people used to come in and beat these teams. If you're going to win, you're going to have to go after them because they're not going to give it away."

The momentum carried the Spartans into the final game as back-to-back blocks by Filisi and Tootoo helped give the home team a 4-0 lead. Iolani fought back, but Maryknoll never trailed at any point in the third set as it was able to complete the sweep and give the girls on its team their first win over the Raiders in their prep careers.

"Because we're such a young team, I wanted to impress upon them that we wanted to make sure that we got ourselves in a good situation," said Ramirez. "This if the first time that they beat Iolani, it's like uncharted territory. It's like ‘oh my gosh, we're up 2-0,' so I wanted to impress upon them how important is it to go in and close it out."

If there was any adjustments that the Spartans made after playing Iolani twice earlier in the year, it was learning how to use Iolani's block against them. Maryknoll recorded 12 kills off of the Raiders' blocks, seven of which came in a 25-13 win in the opening set.

"Although they do a really good job blocking, they have some deficiencies and height is an issue so we want to make sure we capitalize on that," said Ramirez.

The Raiders were led in the loss by Saige Kaahaaina-Torres, who had a double-double of 12 kills and 11 digs.