Until Washington got whacked by the University of Hawai'i and Amber Kaufman's whiffle ball of a volleyball serve Saturday, the Rainbow Wahine remained pretenders among the NCAA elite, not contenders.

This week, as they charge into their 13th season in the Western Athletic Conference, the seventh-ranked 'Bows have transformed potential into promise. Their upset of the then-ninth-ranked Huskies reverberated across the country, but echoed loudest in Hawai'i, where the 'Bows' record-breaking faithful had started to wonder when their team would again make a serious stab at the final four.

Their only win against a top-10 team in the past three seasons came Dec. 8, 2006. Last week's win was cause to celebrate. It erased the frustration of lost opportunities against sixth-ranked UCLA three weeks ago and answered all those pointed and poignant questions about heart, chemistry and the ability to close.

"It felt like we were looking good, looking good and now we finally proved it," Kaufman said after her school-record 11th ace against Washington. Then she ran out of words and shook her head: "So ... pretty happy."

Jamie Houston is averaging 4.5 kills and hitting .279 since watching a match with a .110 hitting percentage two weeks ago. She was last week's tournament MVP and, like Kaufman, ecstatic about hushing the Huskies.

"We didn't pull it off against UCLA," Houston said. "I think it's big because it shows where we are now rather than where we were two weeks ago when we played UCLA. I think we're a better team than we were then."

Now the Rainbow Wahine have the difficult task of keeping the momentum going into December, and getting better against weaker opponents. They played four top-12 teams their first nine matches and probably won't see another ranked opponent until Thanksgiving.

Coach Dave Shoji believes it can be done, particularly after last Saturday.

"First of all, we're very deep and can bring in players and not lose much, which has been important — especially last weekend when (Stephanie) Ferrell came in to spell Aneli (Cubi-Otineru) and the double sub with (Jessica) Keefe and (Stephanie) Brandt did some good things," Shoji said. "We can play all four middles without losing much. I learned that we can play real good sideout volleyball and that's key to beating really good teams. It's hard to stop those teams, but if you just can side out then you are pretty tough to beat, too."

Ferrell, a redshirt freshman, was a true terminator last week, hitting .500. She played front row for Cubi-Otineru, who was suffering from the flu, nearly every rotation at the end of the UW match. Cubi-Otineru played nearly flawless in the backrow, leading Hawai'i with 17 digs and perfect passing. She has just one reception error in 144 attempts this season.

"I think she's the key to that team," Cincinnati coach Reed Sunahara had said a week earlier of Cubi-Otineru. "She's the glue. She's not a star, but she does everything well."

Passing and serving — Cubi-Otineru's strengths — are where the 'Bows beat the Huskies. With Washington unable to cope with Kaufman's jump-float serve and its high-risk servers spraying 13 errors and only three aces, Hawai'i dominated ball control.

The Huskies out-hit (.353-.260) and out-blocked (17-7) UH by huge margins, but lost control when it mattered most. UW shanked passes and put serves in the bottom of the net, while UH hitters took turns hitting straight down over the opposing setter.

Cubi-Otineru gave some of the credit to Hawai'i's schedule, which was immensely harder than what Washington faced.

"I especially think Penn State and UCLA, those games before and us not finishing it ... we practiced that a lot over the last two weeks," she said. "That really helped a lot. We were up and up with them and we just knew how to finish it."

Coming back from two games down against a top-10 opponent is remarkable and rare. The last time the Rainbow Wahine did it was against Brigham Young a decade ago. Before that, it had not happened since the fourth-ranked 'Bows rallied in San Jose to beat the Spartans in the 1986 Northwest Regional.

Shoji traced Saturday's turning point back to Ferrell's subtle tip shot that erased match point at 23-24 in the third set.

"We had a ball coming back at us and still we converted," he said. "They actually had a swing for the match. That's the kind of team you've got to beat. Once we got over that hump we felt like we've got a chance here. I don't think we ever panicked. We had a chance to win Game 2; Game 3 was a tossup. It was just a matter of a point here and there and momentum was on our side."

Now, how to keep it?

QUICK SETS

It is "Student Weekend" and University of Hawai'i system students get a free ticket to the Idaho or Boise State matches by showing valid UH identification card at Stan Sheriff Center Box Office when picking up their free ticket and again at Gate A the night of the match.

In this week's national rankings, Amber Kaufman is 20th in aces per set (0.61), Dani Mafua 31st in assists (10.90) and Jamie Houston 43rd in kills (3.89). As a team, Hawai'i is third in assists (13.72), fifth in kills (14.59) and 15th in hitting (.288).

The schedule is out for this year's WAC Tournament, Nov. 20 to 23 at Stan Sheriff Center. New Mexico State set a WAC Tournament attendance record last year, averaging 1,353 per session.

With 1,087 digs, UH senior libero Tara Hittle needs 17 to pass Lily Kahumoku and reach seventh on the career list.