Arnold responds to report

There hadn’t been much in the way of news lately on the NCAA’s investigation of the Hawaii men’s basketball program — until Wednesday afternoon.

As we reported at the Star-Advertiser, UH is considering self-imposing some sanctions to get ahead of what the NCAA is likely coming down with in the near future. Why would it do that? Well, if executed properly, UH might be able to save itself from some of the harshest possible punishment being discussed (and only the NCAA knows exactly what that is).

The Rainbow Warriors proceeded with practice like normal on Wednesday, as they have since this part of the preseason began on Oct. 4.

“First I’ve heard of it,” Arnold said after the practice. “So, again, we’ve gone through no comments on that (NCAA investigation) situation since the beginning, so first I’ve heard of it.”

Arnold was then asked if he had any concerns on what UH might try to impose.

“Don’t even know what it is,” Arnold said. “So, we’ll address that once I have some kind of information.”

That was the extent of the Q&A on the subject, though Arnold remained to answer other topics that you can find below.

My take: It’s understandable he couldn’t say much at the moment. But from what we hear, things are in motion. You might hear more on this sooner rather than later.

Wednesday’s breaking news story on it is here, in case you missed it.

Ferd Lewis has a column on the subject running in Thursday’s print edition.

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As for other happenings on Wednesday, point guard Quincy Smith remained out at practice — the third straight one he missed.

“He got X-rays today, so he did those during practice so I don’t know where he’s at with that,” Arnold said. “I can probably comment more once I get a look at the X-rays. But obviously we need him in there. He’s one of our big returnees and a guy we expect a lot out of this year. So hopefully he’ll be back out there as soon as possible.”

It was maybe the most hot and humid practice of the entire preseason so far. The team had to be careful, as the Gym 2 floor is prone to condensing and making players slip.

“I thought the team did a good job,” Arnold said. “I thought they worked their way through it, and a little bit of adversity but I thought it was a good practice.”

Besides Smith, all other players were in action. That’s a victory of sorts for the Rainbow Warriors, given how banged up they were just a week ago.

The team has Thursday off. Arnold said he’s taking a one-day recruiting trip to the West Coast and will be back before practice resumes on Friday. The team plans its second officiated intrasquad scrimmage (not including the Green & White festivities) on Saturday.

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The Big West men’s hoops media preseason poll and all-conference team is set to come out on Thursday morning.

In the interest of full disclosure, here’s how I voted.

1. UC Irvine
2. UC Santa Barbara
3. Cal State Northridge
4. Long Beach State
5. Cal Poly
6. Hawaii
7. UC Davis
8. Cal State Fullerton
9. UC Riverside

All-conference team
1. C Alan Williams, UCSB
2. G Mike Caffey, LBSU
3. F Isaac Fotu, UH
4. F Stephen Maxwell, CSUN
5. G Corey Hawkins, UCD
6. C Mamadou Ndiaye, UCI

Here’s what Arnold said about where he thought UH might land: “Don’t know. I think there’s six teams with four starters coming back. I’d probably expect those guys to be picked pretty high. You look at Irvine and Santa Barbara, they were 1 and 2 last year. All their main guys back, player of the year (Alan Williams) back. I would probably think they’d be 1 and 2. Where everyone falls after that, I’m not too sure.”