Is University of Hawaii Women’s Volleyball coach Dave Shoji relieved to have Lily Kahumoku back after the Rainbow Wahine struggled last season without her?

“Ohhh yeah,” he responds quickly. “We missed her last season because we weren’t really ready to replace her. Her leaving was unexpected. But we’re very happy to have her back. Her mind is clearer now. She’s settled down. She’s more mature, more focused.”

Kahumoku, WAC Player of the Year and a first team All-American in 2000, sat out the 2001 season for personal reasons. Granted, the Wahine had to resurrect themselves last year after losing starters Jessica Sudduth and Veronica Lima from the previous 32-1 season, but they clearly missed Kahumoku’s team-high 4.51 kills per game as they struggled to dig out a 29-6 record.

“I’ve been playing volleyball … well, all my life,” Kahumoku says, clearly still sensitive about responding to questions about her year-long hiatus. “I needed a break, to reassess everything that was going on in my life.

“Sometimes when you’re away, it makes you re-evaluate what you had before you left. It makes you realize and appreciate just how special things are in Hawaii. It’s so nice to be back here.”

This year Kahumoku will have to share the spotlight with close friend and teammate Kim Willoughby, who had an epic season last year, leading the nation in kills (850) and kills per game (7.20) on her way to being named WAC Player of the Year and first team All-American. It was the fourth best season of all time for an NCAA player.

But that spotlight, according to their coach, is bright enough to include both players, if not the entire team.

“They understand they’ll both be counted on,” Shoji says of Kahumoku and Willoughby. “I don’t think the egos are going to get in the way. And that goes for the rest of the team, too. We can’t have one person grabbing all the limelight, and I think they know that.”

MidWeek caught up with the Spike Sisters during the annual UH Women’s Volleyball Camp last week at the Stan Sheriff Center. Willoughby was the first to arrive, striding in from the intense noontime heat through the security door in back of the arena.

“Hi,” she says, smiling and extending her hand. “We just finished another camp this morning,” she says, referring to Rich Miano’s annual speed camp for the UH football team. In her hand is a sandwich, obviously nabbed on the fly on her way to the center. “Oh, I always eat like this. I’m going to summer school, doing camps … it’s always like this.”

Poised and relaxed, she seems eager to talk about growing up on her dad’s farm near Houma, La.

“No, I didn’t work on the farm,” she says with a sheepish grin. “I’ve never actually had a real job. Just school and sports.”

A 2000 graduate of Assumption High School in Napoleonville, La., Willoughby received all-state honors in volleyball, basketball and track and field. In volleyball, she led her team to three consecutive state championships while being named Louisiana Player of the Year both as a junior and senior. In basketball, she was named to the all-state team four times and earned Louisiana Player of the Year accolades twice.

Back on the farm, Willoughby says her father hired the help he needed, allowing her, her sister and five brothers to concentrate on schoolwork and other interests.

“I’ve always loved math. It’s my strongest subject,” she says, adding that she was a member of science and computer clubs in high school. “But computers, well, I know how to use them and do what I need to do on them, but I don’t just sit down and hang out.”

Though interested in a professional volleyball or basketball career after college, Willoughby says she’s focused on only two things right now — winning a national championship for UH and becoming a teacher.

“I love working with kids, especially seventh and eighth graders,” she says. “That’s the in-between stage, when they’re all saying to themselves, ‘I have to fit in.’ It’s a critical time for them, and I’d like to think I could give them some inspiration and direction.”

On Willoughby’s left arm is a large tattoo, a diamond with words written in Chinese at each of the four points. “It says ‘Dedication’ at the top, ‘Determination’ at the bottom, ‘Heart’ on the right and ‘Love’ on the left,” she translates.

“I show all my kids at camp the tattoo and tell them these are the four words I live by. I tell them that every night before I go to bed, I ask myself if I lived up to these words that day. This way, I have no regrets before I go to sleep. If you don’t satisfy yourself, you won’t be able to satisfy anyone else.”

Willoughby says she gets her determination from her mother, Lula Mae Willoughby, who survived a serious car accident when Kim was a junior in high school. “The doctors said she’d never walk again, and when she was going through physical therapy, she suffered a stroke,” Willoughby recalls. “Several days later, she suffered another stroke. They said that if she survived at all, her brain would be a vegetable.”

Today, Willoughby’s mom is walking with a cane and is almost 80 percent recovered from her strokes. Her daughter says, “She has always been like, ‘If I’m going to do this, nobody’s going to stop me.’”

Willoughby herself has faced overwhelming challenges as well, including her boyfriend passing away when she was a high school senior. Defying the odds and overcoming challenges is the message she wants to deliver to kids. “They all have circumstances that make it easy for them to say, ‘I can’t do this, I can’t do that.’ I want to eliminate ‘can’t’ from their vocabulary.”

Fans who’ve followed Willoughby’s career at UH may be interested to learn that despite being listed at 6 feet in their programs, she’s actually only 5 feet 10 inches tall. She more than makes up for it, though, with her 10-foot-3-inch reach.

“She’s a specimen,” remarks Kahumoku, who at 6 feet 3 inches has a 10-foot-2-inch reach herself. “Playing with Kim gives me so much confidence. I feel lucky to be playing in the presence of such an athlete. She has it all — finesse, coordination, grace. I’m just in awe watching her.”

The feeling is mutual. “When I play with Lily,” Willoughby says, “when I watch her, the way she hits the ball, I tell her, ‘Whoever taught you to hit, I want to know that person … I want to take lessons.’

“I’m in awe of her. She does unbelievable things on the court, things only she can do. She’ll dig a ball no one else would even try for. She’s willing to give up her body and get bruised and scraped up. It doesn’t matter to her.

“I love Lily. If I have something wrong in my life, something bothering me, she’s always there for me.”

Kahumoku is one of those rare individuals who is half-Hawaiian but never lived in Hawaii until she reached high school. Her mother, Gayle, a nurse, is from South Carolina. Her father, Roscoe Kahumoku, was born and raised in Hawaii. His career in the Air Force (he and his wife now live in Enterprise, Ala.) kept Lily and her two younger sisters on the move most of their lives.

“I’ve never lived anywhere more than three years,” Kahumoku says.

It was a lifestyle she feels had a lot to do with her choosing to come to Hawaii. “When you move around so much, you always have to adjust to new environments, new beginnings. It’s hard to develop a strong sense of identity. I needed to learn that, to discover my identity. I needed to see where my heritage was. Now that I’ve come here, I really like it. I don’t know where I’ll go after college, but I’ll always feel like Hawaii is home base now.”

Kahumoku’s older half-sister, Jessica Alvarado, was a star volleyball player for Long Beach State, a strong role model for her younger sisters. But it was Roscoe Kahumoku who was behind Lily’s zeal for volleyball.

“I didn’t have a choice,” she says. “My father made that decision for me when I was 4 years old. He was my driving force. He helped me learn how to compete and instilled a lot of passion and determination in me.”

Kahumoku transferred to Kamehameha Schools from Coronado High School in Lubbock, Texas, where she’d earned all-state honors in 1996. Her parents remained on the Mainland while she lived on Oahu with her legal guardian, former all-pro football player Rockne Freitas.

Kahumoku was strong academically, a National Junior Honor Society member in the ninth grade and an honor roll student at Kamehameha. But it was her height and phenomenal talent on the volleyball court that attracted attention from the collegiate world.

She led Kamehameha to consecutive state titles in 1997 and 1998 and was named Hawaii state Player of the Year both seasons. She also was chosen as Hawaii High School Volleyball Athlete of the Year by the Gatorade Circle of Champions and was named as a Volleyball magazine second-team All-American in her junior and senior seasons.

“I was always tall,” she says. “In sixth grade, I was 5 feet 11. By eighth grade, I was 6 feet 3 and weighed 120 pounds. I looked like a Holocaust victim.”

But she grew into her body and was the only freshman named to the all-WAC first team in 1999, then returned to earn WAC Player of the Year and All-American honors as a sophomore. A dominant force in the 2000 NCAA tournament, she tallied 23 kills, 17 digs and six blocks against Long Beach State, earning a spot on the NCAA all-tournament team.

Previously a psychology major, Kahumoku is changing her major this year to political science and plans to remain at UH for graduate school. As a red-shirt, she still has two seasons to play for UH. Like Willoughby, she has spent a summer playing with the U.S. national team and is a shoo-in to be invited to play with the team again. She has no plans, however, to pursue a spot on the 2004 Olympic team.

“I will not leave my collegiate career to play for the national team,” she states. “I would rather go to the Olympics as a spectator than a participant. I know what it takes to train for the Olympics. To train that hard and not win, I think I’d end up at Kahi Mohala.”

Willoughby on the other hand, says she looks forward to the Olympics. “I won’t leave UH to do it, though,” she points out. “My priority is graduating from school. I’m still young, only 21. I have plenty of time to play for the national team. If I don’t go to the 2004 games, I can play in 2008.”

Kahumoku says she’s excited about returning to UH to finish her collegiate career with Willoughby and close friend Maja Gustin. Both she and Willoughby are quick to claim that they wouldn’t be where they are without their teammates.

“We’re a family,” Willoughby says. “We watch out for each other and push each other to be the best players we can be.”

The Rainbow Wahine are ranked No. 2 in the country this year, behind Stanford, a veteran team the Wahine beat handily in an exhibition match last March.

The UH season opens Aug. 30 at Stan Sheriff Center against Ohio State in the Hawaiian Airlines Wahine Volleyball Classic. They’ll also face UCLA and Colorado.

Despite having arguably his most talented team in years, the ever-cautious Shoji, who was just named by USA Volleyball as an All-Time Great (23 20-win seasons and seven national titles), keeps his optimism guarded:

“Our record will be better this year because we don’t have as tough a schedule as we had last year. We’ll be ready to go.”

How about reaching the Final Four?

“We have the ingredients. We have the talent,” he allows. “But there’s a lot of stuff we still have to find out about ourselves.”

Kahumoku and Willoughby already have the answer to that question. The real question is whether the rest of the country is ready for them. They’d better be. These two monster spikers aren’t just hungry for a shot at the title, they’re drooling!

“We’re coming off a win over Stanford, who’s ranked No. 1,” Kahumoku points out. “We didn’t just hold our own, we demolished them! I’m thinking beyond reaching the Final Four. I’ve been there, done that. I’m thinking all the way.”

This year, the Final Four will be held in New Orleans, Willoughby’s own back yard. UH volleyball fans have led the country in attendance since 1994, averaging 7,103 per game. But the entire state of Louisiana would brave a planet of West Nile mosquitoes to see their favorite daughter play for an NCAA championship.

“People tell me how great it is that I’m All-American,” Willoughby says. “I say, ‘Yeah, that’s great, that’s dandy. But without a national title, I’m no one.

“There’s no way I’m just going to ‘show up’ for the Final Four. It’s not going to happen.”