Her return to the familiar came in a foreign place for Washington libero Tamari Miyashiro.

"My actual first collegiate match was in China," said the 2005 Kalani High graduate. "At the beginning of the match I looked at (All-America setter) Courtney Thompson and said, 'This is my first match.' She said, 'Welcome to the big leagues.' "

The Huskies traveled to Beijing and Shanghai for two weeks in June to play four matches this past summer.

"China won the Olympics, and it was awesome to be in the same country," said Miyashiro, a redshirt freshman. "It's just different. It was a really good experience."

It helped get her collegiate career off to a good start. She went on to post double figures in digs in 27 matches, with 30-dig matches four times. Miyashiro said being named to the Pacific-10 All-Freshman team was "shocking," but shouldn't have been. She led the No. 3 Huskies in digs and ranks third in the conference with 5.50 digs per game.

Miyashiro credits her redshirt year for preparing her. She said UW coaches had asked her if she wanted to take the year to learn their system and train under Thompson and All-American Candace Lee, a libero who completed her eligibility last season.

"I thought about it for 10 seconds," Miyashiro said, before agreeing.

"I got to learn a lot, even though I was sitting," she said. "It was a whole year of learning the system. It's so different from what I was used to. It was really good for me. I was lucky I got to sit out a year. I just got to watch what everybody did. It was an advantage."

She traveled with the team for every away match, suiting up and warming up each time.

Learning the routine for game preparation helped her this season when she amassed 550 digs, only the second player in school history to collect 500 in a season.

Studying players on game tape and at live matches, Miyashiro called upon her newfound knowledge "all the time."

"I learn more from watching than by people telling me," she said. "Just by watching, I knew where I needed to be in certain situations. The only reason I knew where to be was because of last year.

"It kept me humble. I was kind of used to playing a lot," said the two-time Advertiser All-State first-team selection. "It wasn't that bad, because I knew by watching and learning I could be twice as good when I actually got into the games."

Last season, Washington won its first national championship in volleyball. Going through the tournament helped Miyashiro learn the dynamics of a high intensity postseason. This year the Huskies (25-4, 15-3 Pac-10 tied for second) are seeded sixth in the NCAAs, and open against Colorado State tomorrow.

"There's some tough teams out there. Just the brackets, the whole tournament, there's some good teams out there," Miyashiro said. "The Pac-10 helps us get ready for it. It's going to be hard, but we need to play our volleyball and we should be fine."

Miyashiro admits that she doesn't feel like a freshman, and it makes her pause every time they announce her as one during pre-match introductions.

"Being around one whole year longer than a real freshman, I can tell the difference being a student and a college athlete," she said.

Once the season is over, Miyashiro will likely train at both setter and libero. But when next season rolls around, she'll likely be donning the different-colored uniform again.

Miyashiro joins defensive specialist Ashley Aratani, out of 'Iolani, as two Hawai'i players on the UW roster.

"She's the sweetest person I've ever met," Miyashiro said of Aratani. "It's just awesome having her on the same team. There's things we go through that no one else can understand. We're the most laid-back ones on the team. Our teammates look to us for that part of our game. She's an awesome player too."

Reach Leila Wai at lwai@honoluluadvertiser.com.