LOS ANGELES —Third-ranked Hawai'i overcame a mid-match offensive meltdown last night to reach yet another NCAA Volleyball regional.

After making 15th-ranked Southern California look bad for the second straight year in the opening sets, the Rainbow Wahine barely survived a desperate Trojan rally in a 25-20, 25-18, 16-25, 27-25 victory at USC's Galen Center.

"The last couple points in Game 4 it's just who makes the play, real simple, and we made the plays," UH coach Dave Shoji said. "There's no tactical thing at that point. We know what they're doing, they know what we're doing. You've got to make a play and we made three at the end."

The first was Kanani Danielson's match-high 23rd kill, seventh of the set, from the back row. That came with USC serving for the set at 23-24.

The second was Aneli Cubi-Otineru's smash that erased another set point at 24-25.

After the 11th tie of the set, Cubi-Otineru and freshman Brittany Hewitt blocked Kimmee Roleder to give Hawai'i match point. That went down swiftly as USC fed Lauren Williams, who had been free in the middle all night, and Hewitt and Cubi-Otineru stuffed her.

"I knew they'd set No. 8 (Williams)," Cubi-Otineru said. "What did she hit — .407 with 14 kills. She was on. I knew they'd feed her. I just committed, hoping they'd set her and praying to God."

It is the second straight year the 'Bows (30-2) won a subregional here by beating USC (20-10) and the third time in four years they have ended the Trojans' season. The teams have won 10 national titles between them.

After starting out as a smashmouth sequel to last season, this one took on all earmarks of Hawai'i's wild five-set regional win over USC three years ago in Honolulu — the last time UH played a postseason at home.

The Rainbow Wahine, who ran their winning streak to 26 and earned their 18th 30-win season, completely ran out of offense in Set 3 last night.

The Trojans, who had won their last seven, took a breath, found their rhythm and used their height advantage to force 14 hitting errors in each of the last two sets. UH had 11 total in the first two.

In the final set, USC stuffed nine balls, relentlessly blocking Amber Kaufman and Cubi-Otineru, to overcome a 23-19 deficit.

Cubi-Otineru struggled all night, for the second straight night, but came through with 14 kills and 12 digs. Kaufman was brilliant for two sets, but couldn't cope when USC rallied and the UH passing faltered.

"Amber is a little banged up (abdominal strain) and couldn't turn and hit the ball where she wanted to," Shoji said. "That's why we lost the lead. I don't know how we got those last three, but somehow we manufactured some kills. We just tried to find a way to win."

That grit, phenomenal defense anchored by libero Liz Ka'aihue and another great performance by Danielson have brought the 12th-seeded Rainbows to their 11th regional in 12 years.

They play fifth-seeded Illinois Friday at Stanford's Maples Pavilion. The fourth-seeded Cardinal, which barely survived Saint Mary's last night, plays 10th-seeded Michigan in the other regional semifinal.

Hawai'i found many, many ways to overcome its frustration last night, getting great moments out of reserves Stephanie Brandt, Jayme Lee and Emily Maeda. Stephanie Ferrell started fast and Hewitt was instrumental late. And setter Dani Mafua was the calm in the storm, finding kills somehow, somewhere.

"We just needed one play to fire us all up ," Ka'aihue said. "We just groveled, found a way tonight. It was not pretty."

The only constants were Danielson and the defense. They out-dug USC 68-50 and held the team that leads the nation in kills — at 15-plus per set —to just 38 for the match, and .097 hitting.

Alex Jupiter, 11th in the country in kills, did not get her first until the match was 34 minutes old. She finished with five, to go with nine errors. Senior Jessica Gysin, USC's other all-conference hitter, was 2-for-28 with four errors.

The 'Bows had just nine blocks — to USC's 17 — but it frustrated the Trojan hitters enough that they made 24 attack errors and hit most everything else at a UH defender, with the exception of Williams.

"Our game plan was good," Ka'aihue said. "We set up the defense so the block took an area and we would dig around it. It was easy to dig back there with a good block."

Danielson, the sophomore All-American, also made it look easy.

"Her arm speed is a little different," said USC senior libero Alli Hillgren. "She hangs, then swings really fast. We were trying to stay hard angle on her and she'd hit deep seam."

After nearly 2 hours, in front of an equally divided crowd of 1,355 that was equally exhausted, the Rainbow Wahine saw their win as validation for a low seed they took as a slap in the face — especially after beating the Pac-10's top two teams three months ago.

"Outside of Hawai'i, I bet not many people thought we'd win this match," Shoji said. "The WAC has been blasted for weak RPI. The Pac-10 supposedly was the premier conference. They got seven teams in. I don't know how many are left, but not many.

"We felt slighted when the seedings came out. This validates that we are a good team. We want to go farther. We want to go all the way to the final four. We've decided to take them one at a time. They are all winnable games but they are tough games now, but this definitely was a good win for our program and our league. It's huge."

NOTES

The Pac-10 started the NCAA Championship with seven teams and is down to ninth-seeded Cal and Stanford, which beat Saint Mary's 15-13 in the fifth last night at home. Kentucky swept 14th-seeded Oregon last night and eighth-seeded UCLA was upset by Baylor. Arizona lost in the first round and Washington in the second.

Hawai'i returns home today for two days of school before heading to Stanford.