Road woes
That’s 26, count ’em, 26 combined Western Athletic Conference road losses for the Hawaii men’s and women’s basketball teams.
First-year men’s coach Gib Arnold and second-year coach Dana Takahara-Dias are still looking for their first league road breakthroughs. The programs’ last WAC road wins came under Bob Nash and Jim Bolla in 2008-09.
Perhaps a positive sign for the Rainbow Warriors: After trailing by 30 at New Mexico State, the second unit (featuring UH’s three freshmen) trimmed the gap to the final margin of 18 in the 82-64 loss.
At this point, when it’s becoming apparent that UH will again be fighting to stay out of last place for the rest of the WAC season, you look for whatever positives you can find.
That’s why tomorrow’s game at eighth-place Louisiana Tech (9-9, 0-4 WAC) looms large. Every win is huge when you’re trying to stay out of the basement, especially when you can gain an edge tiebreaker-wise on one of the teams you’re going to be nervously eyeballing the standings for the rest of the way.
Three wins wasn’t enough to save UH from missing out on the WAC tourney last year, so getting one at LaTech is critical.
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The 24-point beating the Rainbow Wahine suffered at Idaho, meanwhile, is disappointing coming off a closely contested home loss to Louisiana Tech, one of the top teams in the women’s WAC.
Idaho, probably a middle-of-the-pack team, outplayed the Wahine (6-10, 0-3 WAC) in all phases except rebounding in a 72-48 decision at the Cowan Spectrum in Moscow. Not exactly the way you want to start off a stretch of five straight road games.
The Wahine continue that brutal road stretch at Boise State (10-7, 1-2) tomorrow, then return home for a two-day respite before taking to the road again.
Great blog Brian.
Man, when you have to thump your chest over the fact that your team caught up a little in garbage time against the opponents third stringers you have really come to the end of the spin zone.
Has the UH basketball program fallen that far that it has come to this?
Yes, yes, harrowing times, harrowing times. Frodo had ’em on his journey. Spidey has his problems. Lombardi, as successful as he was, didn’t have his golden age or his Packers forever. We must needs remember, also, this being Gib’s first season; we must needs remember Amis been out. You know?
And I dunno about all this “return to Riley” talk (and it’s not just here @ blogs; overheard from other table @ local sports bar other day). Dunno what worth is this Nash lamentation (which ended up being a replay of “Riley’s losing years” classic channel. You’d think Nash would’ve been observing the pit falls all those years as # 2, seemingly). They had their time. Now give Gib his time, too.
i agree with manoa mist. it seems that we are proud that we were able to catch up against their bench guys…when the young guys played most of the 2nd half and got us into that deep 30 point hole…..it’s a shame that he’s come to the point where he can only blame the seniors (indirectly).