HONOLULU — Trevell Jordan didn’t see it coming. No one did.
The Grand Canyon middle blocker and his teammates were summoned to a meeting in April, for what the Antelopes assumed would be a talk about the following NCAA season.
In a sense, it was — there wouldn’t be one. GCU athletic administration informed players that the Phoenix school had opted to reclassify men’s volleyball to a club sport in 2026.
“It was shock,” Jordan recalled Monday. “All of us were very sad because we thought that this was going to be something great. We were building really great connections with each other, so we expected to keep those connections.”
Now Jordan, a 6-foot-10 sophomore from Mesa, Ariz., is in the process of forging new ones with Hawaii, one of the sport’s elite college programs over the last decade.
[Note: See below for more photos of Hawaii men’s volleyball’s Monday practice to prepare for Friday’s season opener against NJIT.]
The Rainbow Warriors, who return five starters and 12 letterwinners, openly aspire for the national championship after falling in straight sets to UCLA in May’s national semifinals.
UH is ranked No. 2 in the preseason AVCA and Big West Conference polls behind defending national champion and rival Long Beach State. It is the ninth straight year the Rainbow Warriors are in the national top five at season’s start.
Jordan is eager to test his abilities in a setting with more school and community buy-in and, to be sure, higher expectations.
“This is a whole different environment, different standards that I really love to see in the sport of volleyball,” he said. “I’m so pumped to be here.”
After fall training and some break time over the Christmas holiday, Charlie Wade’s group got back at it Monday as part of a breathless week leading up to Friday’s 7 p.m. opener against the New Jersey Institute of Technology.
UH players and staff will get their Big West championship rings after Sunday’s 5 p.m. rematch with NJIT.
GCU’s sudden announcement stunned the men’s volleyball community; the Antelopes were a program on the rise and GCU, formerly labeled a for-profit institution, was known for lavish spending for its athletics programs. Wade accurately predicted a feeding frenzy for the Antelopes’ talent. Some of the Lopes’ other standouts found homes: hitter Trent Moser went to BYU, setter Jaxon Herr went to Penn State, libero Matthew Thornton landed at UCLA.
Wade, UH’s 17th-year leader, felt it was a no-brainer to extend Jordan a life raft. Jordan played and started in 21 of GCU’s 28 matches last year, contributing 1.68 kills per set and 1.02 blocks per set. More importantly, he was already familiar with many of UH’s players, including Tread Rosenthal, Finn Kearney, Justin Todd and Kainoa Wade, as well as new UH assistant Donan Cruz, from his time over the summer competing with Team USA.
Junior setter Tread Rosenthal has emerged as the Rainbow Warriors’ unquestioned team leader, according to coach Charlie Wade. (Spectrum News/Brian McInnis)
“He had offers to go to every top program in the country,” Wade said, “and ironically they were pushing him to make a fast decision, and they pushed him towards us, because I was the one saying hey, ‘I’m in for the long haul, I want you to be here and take your time to figure it out.’”
Wade said it fascinates him to watch how newcomers like Jordan handle the trappings of men’s volleyball stardom at UH, especially once they become known in the local community.
He’s constantly tinkering with the formula of what will keep UH in the hunt for a third national title. That included booking his team for an as-of-yet unnamed tournament in Anaheim, Calif., Feb. 19 and 20 that will provide the four participating schools — UH, UCLA, USC and LBSU — with Name, Image and Likeness revenue for their players.
“That’s what keeps me up at night, for sure,” Wade said. “It is sustaining the success. To have a good year, but we’ve been really good for a long time and we need to not only be really good, but be the best. The best every year. That is difficult to attain, and that is the expectation — to be the best. Do everything you can to be better today and be the best at the end.”
Jordan joins a pair of capable sophomores at the middle position in Todd and Ofeck Hazan. Maryknoll School alum Alex Parks and 7-foot freshman Roman Payne round out the group that lost vocal leader Kurt Nusterer to a lucrative job in economics.
Wade said Rosenthal has emerged as a true team leader at setter and he hopes for a “payoff year” for him in his junior season. He’s backed up by sophomore Victor Lowe, senior Vladimir Kubr and freshman Magnus Hettervik of Norway.
UH has an embarrassment of riches at the pins with Adrien Roure, Louis Sakanoko, Kristian Titriyski, Kearney and Kainoa Wade. Sophomore Mitchell Croft and freshman Thatcher Fahlbusch add depth.
The Warriors lost a fan favorite at libero in Farrington High alumnus ‘Eleu Choy but brought in a player with Canadian U21 national team experience in junior Quintin Greenidge. Kai Taylor and Matthew Wheels are the team’s other defensive specialists.
“I think we got really good recruits,” Sakanoko said. “Quintin, Trevell, Mitch, all those people, they’re going to step on the court and be really, really good. We lost Eleu Choy, who’d been here for a while, but we got Quintin, who’s as good as he is.”
Rosenthal, Roure and Titriyski were named to the preseason All-Big West team.
UH confirmed Monday that assistant coach Kupono Fey has been elevated to associate head coach, replacing Milan Zarkovic in that role. Zarkovic, in some ways the emotional pulse of the team, took an assistant job at UCLA in the offseason.
Cruz, a Maui native and the former head coach at Ball State, was hired in September and is focusing on the setting/offensive game.
“Kupono and Donan have stepped up amazing for us,” Rosenthal said. “Obviously Milan is one of the best coaches in the world and it’s a huge loss. I’m sure UCLA’s happy that they got him. But Kupono and Donan have trained us very well.”
Hawaii coach Charlie Wade, right, has a new makeup of his staff with associate head coach Kupono Fey, center left, and new assistant Donan Cruz, left. (Spectrum News/Brian McInnis)
Kupono Fey, a UH alumnus, has been on staff with Wade as an assistant since 2023. (Spectrum News/Brian McInnis)
Hawaii hitter Louis Sakanoko voiced confidence in the team’s handful of newcomers to join an experienced roster. (Spectrum News/Brian McInnis)
Brian McInnis covers the state’s sports scene for Spectrum News Hawaii. He can be reached at brian.mcinnis@charter.com.
