Tonight's boys volleyball championship game was four years in the making for Kamehameha-Hawai'i, which will play in its first state title game.

Kamehameha-Hawai'i defeated Roosevelt, 25-19, 25-16, in a semifinal match at McKinley last night in the New City Nissan/HHSAA Boys Division I State Volleyball Championships in front of about 600 fans.

Kamehameha, the third seed and Big Island Interscholastic Federation champ, will meet top-seeded Punahou, the Interscholastic League of Honolulu champion and winner of the past two state titles. The match is scheduled to start at 7:30 p.m. at the University of Hawai'i's Stan Sheriff Center.

Kamehameha improved to 17-4. Roosevelt dropped to 15-2.

The group of seniors on this year's Warrior team were freshmen during Kamehameha's first year as a varsity program.

"We were 1-13 our first year, and playing varsity even though we should have been junior varsity," Kamehameha coach Guy Enriques said. "That year, after the season began, I wrote down a set of goals we wanted to meet. This year, it was to be in the top two. And we're here.

"This is not an accident. This is four years of preparation."

The teams kept it close in Game 1 last night, with neither managing to gain more than a two-point lead until Kamehameha pulled away at 21-18 on a kill by senior outside hitter Andrew Love. The Warriors went on to score four of the next five points, winning the game on a Roosevelt hitting error.

The Rough Riders "just made some crucial errors down the stretch. But we made errors early, too, so I guess it didn't matter," coach Kaui Mendonca said.

"It gave us a lot of momentum," Love said of the point when Kamehameha pulled away. "But we knew from past experience that we couldn't lighten up."

Love finished with 10 kills.

Roosevelt junior Kaina Palama had seven kills and senior Bryce Kozuki added six. Roosevelt — with three players 6 feet and taller compared to 10 on Kamehameha — usually plays without abandon against a taller block, but looked intimidated by the Warriors' size advantage and tried to avoid the block.

"I told them to swing away," Mendonca said. "I told them we didn't get here by dinking, so why are we dinking now?"

Reach Leila Wai at lwai@honoluluadvertiser.com.