Seabury Hall struggled to find its comfort zone yesterday, but once it did, the fifth-ranked boys volleyball team in the state was unrelenting.

Dylan Hamilton amassed 13 kills as the Spartans beat Kohala, 22-25, 25-14, 25-13 and 25-19, in a quarterfinal of the New City Nissan Division II Boys Volleyball State Championships at Farrington.

Seabury Hall, the tournament's third seed, improved to 10-0 and will play No. 2 Moanalua (16-0), the O'ahu Interscholastic Association champion, in a 7 p.m. semifinal at Farrington today. Top seed and Interscholastic League of Honolulu champion Hawai'i Baptist (19-3) meets No. 4 seed and Big Island Interscholastic Federation champion Pāhoa (14-4) in a 7 p.m. semifinal at Kalani.

Middle blocker Rocky DeLyon added 11 kills, outside hitter Conner Snow had 10 kills and middle blocker Josh Chapple eight in Seabury's balanced attack.

"That's our game, we have five attackers who can all put the ball away with relative ease," said Hamilton, a senior outside hitter. "We have some big middles, which helps the outside guys because they're so big, the blockers have to commit to the middle."

Seabury Hall head coach Caleb Palmer said while his team struggled in the opening set, he was happy that they were able to make the adjustments to "a good Kohala team.

"We had to play a little differently than we usually do to win," Palmer said. "It would have been nice to win that first set, but at the same time, it showed some resiliency by our players that they were able to come back and that they're grounded enough to not get too up or down."

There were 10 lead changes and 15 ties in the first set — the last coming at 22-all. DJ Wong's fifth kill of the set gave Kohala the lead for good and the Spartans committed consecutive errors to end the set.

Hamilton said Palmer told the team to "relax and settle down.

"He told us that it wasn't our best game and that we needed to reduce the amount of errors we were making," he said.

The Spartans responded almost immediately, jumping to a 4-0 lead in Set 2. Hamilton extended the lead to 8-3 after a cross-court shot and after an ace by Mark Walker made it 12-5, Kohala was forced to call timeout.

"The errors — especially in our serve-receive game — really hampered us and took us out of our rhythm," Cowboys coach Brent Cornillez said. "Give Seabury Hall credit, they are a good team and they play very good defense."

Back-to-back kills by DeLyon made it 21-13 and forced another Kohala timeout. The Spartans close out the second set by scoring four of the next five points.

Seabury easily won the third set, then surged to a 4-0 lead in the fourth. A Kohala hitting error made it 12-6, but the Cowboys closed to 15-13 after a Kuliamai Aveiro-Kalaniopio's ace. Seabury Hall then scored six of the next eight points and held on for the victory.

Holden Awong had 43 assists and Josh Sutherland recorded 19 digs for the Spartans.

OTHER QUARTERFINALS

At Farrington High School

MOANALUA DEF. HAWAI'I PREP, 25-22, 25-20, 23-25, 25-17

Nā Menehune (16-0) beat the Ka Makani (12-4) to remain undefeated on the season.

At Kalani High School

HAWAI'I BAPTIST DEF. WAIPAHU, 25-15, 25-11, 25-18

Ryan Leung had 15 kills, Michael Fisher seven and Chad Barretta seven to lead the Eagles (19-3) over the Marauders (12-4). Duketoa Tili had seven kills and Tatupu Tatupu five for Waipahu.

PāHOA DEF. WAIMEA, 25-20, 25-16, 22-25, 25-17

Isaiah Ekau recorded 21 kills and John Byrd 15 to lead the Daggers (14-4) over the Menehunes (11-4). David Kaohelauli'i had 12 kills and Kevin Killermann seven for Waimea.