UPDATED: Warriors take down first-place UC Davis
With a healthy squad feeding off a balanced, healthy diet of steals, transition fast-break layups and solid halfcourt execution on offense, Hawai’i raced past visiting first-place UC Davis, 84-76, in a Big West Conference men’s basketball showdown Thursday night.
A late-awakening crowd of 5,739 at the Stan Sheriff Center watched Aaron Valdes score 21 points and Stefan Jankovic and Mike Thomas each add 13 points as the Rainbow Warriors improved to 14-6 overall, 2-2 in the Big West. The Aggies fell to 14-4, 4-1, and had their five-game win streak snapped.
Isaac Fleming contributed nine points, six steals, five assists and three rebounds with no turnovers in 22 minutes off the bench, and senior guard Garrett Nevels — who had missed the previous three games after undergoing surgery on his right (shooting) hand on Dec. 31 — added nine points and one assist in his return to the starting lineup.
Forward Negus Webster-Chan, who missed last Saturday’s 66-62 loss at UC Riverside due to flu symptoms, pitched in with eight points, two rebounds, two assists and two steals in 20 minutes off the bench.
“We had a lot of energy tonight, and the bottom line is, everybody’s healthy,” UH coach Benjy Taylor said. “When we have all hands on deck, we’re pretty dangerous.”
The Rainbow Warriors made 18 steals — which they converted into 26 points — and held UC Davis’ most dangerous player, senior guard Corey Hawkins, to a relatively quiet 19 points. Hawkins began this week ranked No. 8 among the nation’s top scorers at 20.9 points per game, and finished last night with five 3-point goals in eight attempts.
“We wanted to get out to Hawkins,” Taylor said. “These guys love defense. I thought Isaac had a great game on defense, even without the steals. He wanted to guard Hawkins. We were supposed to switch on the screens, but Isaac said, ‘I ain’t switching,’ and he just fought through the screens.”
UC Davis led, 21-14, after Avery Johnson’s bank shot eight minutes into the game. But Nevels banked in a left-handed shot from about 10 feet out to ignite a 9-3 run capped by Valdes’ layup to close it to 24-23 with 7:48 remaining in the first half. Jankovic then later dropped a baseline floater to start a 14-2 run topped off by Valdes’ fast-break slam dunk off a Fleming assist to put the Rainbow Warriors ahead, 39-30, with 2:30 left.
“We’re going to keep on coming, and we know eventually it will affect the other team,” said Nevels, whose right hand was in a brace. “That’s what you saw tonight.”
Two free throws by Thomas later pushed the lead to 48-35 with 1:07 remaining, and Hawai’i took a 48-37 lead into halftime.
“At halftime I saw we only had five rebounds and they shot 56 percent, and I said, ‘How are we winning?’ ” Taylor said. “Well, it’s because we shot 62 percent. Our halfcourt offense was the best it has been all year. That’s been our Achilles’ heel all year, but tonight we were able to execute our halfcourt offense — everybody was in the place they were supposed to be. When that happens, we can do other things besides transition steals and dunks.”
The Aggies closed it to 48-39 to open the second half, but that was as close as they would get until almost the very end as the Rainbow Warriors led by as many as 24 points midway through the second half.
Hawai’i converted 30 of 59 shots from the field (50.8 percent), and tied its season high with 10 3-pointers (in 22 attempts). The Warriors also shot for their best free-throw percentage of the season at .824 (14 of 17).
Mike Thomas, who left the previous game late in the second half due to a thumb injury, had a perfect shooting night – 3 for 3 from the field, 1 for 1 from 3-point range, and 6 for 6 on free throws.
Hawai’i forced UC Davis into 24 turnovers, while committing just nine. As a result, the Warriors had a 38-6 advantage in the “points off turnovers” category.
“Hawai’i was extremely aggressive from the start,” UC Davis head coach Jim Les said. “Early on, we were able to handle that aggressiveness really well, but for whatever reason, we made some decisions that were out-of-character. They made some 3s; I can live with that because a team can get hot on occasion. But it was the 38 points scored off our turnovers, with most of those ending with layups, made it difficult to come from behind on the road.”
UH was comfortably ahead, 84-70, with two seconds remaining when UC Davis’ Tyler Les was fouled. A fan then threw a small plastic ball onto the court, and the Rainbow Warriors were promptly assessed a technical foul. Soon after, Valdes was whistled for a technical, and Les proceeded to sink all six free throws to make the final score 84-76.
“We gotta keep our composure out there, there were some words said …,” Valdes said.
For safety reasons, Aggies coach Jim Les ordered his team to go directly to the locker room after the game, and the teams reportedly shook hands in the tunnel outside of the fans’ view.
“You can’t throw stuff onto the floor, and then Aaron got a technical,” Taylor said. “We can’t do that, we gotta win with class.”
Hawai’i faces another big challenge at home Saturday against defending regular season champion UC Irvine. The Anteaters (10-8, 3-1) routed CSUN, 80-49, on Thursday.
“This was a big win for us, because we didn’t want to start out 1-3 (in league play),” Valdes said. “Especially with Irvine on Saturday. We’ve got another big game coming up.”
(Game photos courtesy Brandon Flores / www.brandonfloresphotography.com)
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Thursday’s Big West Results
UC Irvine 80, CSUN 49
Cal Poly 66, Cal State Fullerton 55
UC Santa Barbara 83, UC Riverside 75
Hawai’i 84, UC Davis 76
Saturday’s Big West Games
Cal State Fullerton at UC Santa Barbara
Long Beach State at CSUN
UC Riverside at Cal Poly
UC Irvine at Hawai’i, 7 p.m.
Big game Saturday!
Go Bows !!
akuhead2: Plus one…ditto… happy today, clear and get ready for Irvine… UH get that win, sets them up well for next 4 straight road games across two weeks and also for overall season.
One game, One scout, One mindset, and One Win at a Time.
Go Rainbow Warriors !!
🙂
Love the effort.. and what a solid game from captain G Money ! What a difference, even when team was early down, just steady, steady, and team comes roaring back.
SSC, and UH , now have to identify ones that threw stuff on the court, dumb, very dumb.. and either ,they make restitution, MAKE THEM THE FLOOR WIPERS.. or clean up after game, Or ban them for rest of Home regular season games.. Good thing not Like Aloha Stadium, where ones from stands might come out. well, maybe not as many as before.. Safety and Aloha first, Hawaii should not be like that,..i.e. that crazy one, at UCSB who went after Gib last year..
Adding to Tavs’ report on the earlier post, Portnoy or someone on the Curran show said he saw nine policeman surrounding one student.
Talking about floor wipers, the players have to do it themselves ?, as i saw Valdes and another player wiping the floor with towels.
Did UH expose possible pro prospect Hawkins’ some weakness in ball handling ? They caused him to turn over the ball seven times.
When I was leaving the arena I saw a bunch of UH security guards and other ushers surrounding the one student and walking him out. I guess they had enough evidence to press charges if police got called in. The kid looked harmless and scared so not sure if nine cops were necessary but if Portnoy reported that then it was probably wrong as usual coming from him.
I didn’t catch any of those little basketballs that they were throwing into the crowd at halftime. I wonder what company sponsored that and if the marketing wizards at UH led by the Ronald McDonald guy even realized they were handing out stuff that could get easily thrown back on the court.
I guess they won’t be giving that out anymore!
Some of us on here called it before the game that the pressure D was going to make a big difference in this game! Bobbitt was shadowing the UCDavis point guard from baseline to baseline and not even letting him get his hands on the ball a lot of times. That forced Hawkins to bring the ball up a lot of times and he made some crucial turnovers against Fleming and others. Hawkins role on the next level will have to be spot up shooter unless he really improves his ball handling. He is an amazing shooter, I give him that.
It was great team D from all the UH players that led to this win! Need to do it again and step up even more against UC Irvine because I think UCI is actually better team than UCD.
ChuckCheese, yep, the team did a good job (most of the time) of getting Hawkins out of the game. You could tell he was getting frustrated. Other than shooting, he has little to offer UC Davis.
islandman, Hawkins can only shoot. He doesn’t block, steal, rebound, dribble, or assist… he just shoots.
If UH can shoot 50% FGs in a game, they are going to win 90% of their games because of the defense they play.
Isaac Flemings gets my game ball for his 5 assists, 6 steals and ZERO turnovers.
Having Nevels back was a confidence booster.
Too bad Jankovic was in foul trouble… he was having a nice game besides that.
Janks just has to play smart.. so long, athletic, he gets called for touch fouls, and his long arms and legs tangled in offensive players body, the other guy takes a flop.. I think he fouled out 2 games in a row.. He if has 30 min PT.. guaranteed he would put up 22 pt.s. 10 rebounds, 2 blocked shots, 4-4 from FT line, 2 assists , one steal and no turnovers. scoring form 27 feet on in.. Real difference maker on offense.. Just has to get stronger and finish at rim and one, and Rebound every ball within reach.
Impact players this year?
Bobbitt
Fleming
Valdes,
Thomas
Jankovich
Jovanovich,
Nevels,
Smith,.
NWC.. Niko-Dyrbe-healthy, I feel soooo bad for Wato, great young man, wants so much to be part of the pressure D and run out to his 28 foot spot on offense and drop two threes in a row.. He will grad this May..
And as was announced by our UH MBB fan media guy? or what? Ferd , about the APR.. I didn’t know if eligible, eventually, Fotu and Reyes, by Fotu going, or vacating scholarship without fininshin semester and going pro, AND Sammis Reyes, transfer mid year, without finishing the whole school year.. affected APR… wow !! That is what happened to U. Conn. the year before they won National championship.. APR problems and they were knocked out of the previous year’s NCAA playoffs.
Critical.. so UH doesn’t take anymore hits, than necessary, aside from that other thing.. letter? when?
Otherwise, Keep All guys healthy. and on board.. looking good , March towards 19-20 game BWC regular season record before BWC tourney, which is good for fans, UH, Benjy and staff, potential 2 or 3 hybrid SF/PF’s and Center.. that are awaiting ,
NWC.. if he healthy and strong.. he can be that next 22 pt 10 rebound 6 assist, 2 steals, 5-5 from FT line, 3-3 from trifecta land. and No turnovers.. smart ball player.. NWC and Garrett bring a calm and cool presence, and they know how to play basketball.. This team has about 6 more weekends to get ready for BWC tournament..Keep on giving effort and getting better, Shoot like that in half court sets, and NWC, Nevels, Fleming, Thomas, Janks, and Valdes each hitting at least One three pointer.. makes UH even better in half court offensive sets.. With that strong D, agree FUHA.. if UH shoots high forties, and can be even or a little under in rebounds with other team, and still turning over opponents, at SSC and on the road, about 18x a game, with about 10 steals a game..
Team can play with a lot of High and High Mid Major teams.. as long as All 12 guys reasonable health.. it is like energy from Fab time, Henderson/ Artie time, Reggie Cross, Vincent Smalls, Chris Gaines.. AC / Alika… Savo/ English,… Sensley/ Kuebler… Lojeski/ Ahmet Gueye times.. UH MBB is a good thing.
Guys, keep on working, and Fleming, hit that training table, good carbs and protein, work the weights. even NOw.. get some more weight, to about 195-200 , next year.. wow.. UH has 13 out of 14 guys coming back..
Go Bows And Warrior Time !!
🙂
FUA,
Interesting point. It is now common knowledge that Hawaii’s FG% is our weakest point.
Ironically, we ONLY shoot 50% or better when our defense is effective. Here’s a scenario:
A. One night, 20% of our FG attempts come from fast break points and we score on 80% of them.
B. In the same game, 80% of our FG attempts come from half court sets and we score on 40% of them.
*Last night we got about 60 FG attempts… so here’s the math with the scenario above:
A. 20% of 60 is 12 field goal attempts from fast breaks. We got 80% in, so we made about 10 out of 12 in.
B. 80% of 60 is 48 field goal attempts from half court sets. We got 40% in, so we made about 19 out of 48 attempts.
RESULT: For the night, we shot 29 out of 60… about 48%. That’s a good night of shooting actually.
MY POINT: We win two ways… 1) Convert at least 10 shots directly from steals and 2) Convert at least 40% of our FG from half court sets. This formula leads to about 48 percent shooting for the night, which is good for us.
*Remember… these are just minimum amounts. If we can increase our levels in both areas, it increases our chances of winning greatly. It’s hard to win with just one element.
Great Victory BOWZ. Don’t think they won’t be waiting for us in Davis though.
Love the swarming D-fense and liked the platoon substitution early on. Looks like the added rest by all the players on the bench saved our legs…good job Benjy. This team is so fun to watch, you can tell by how loud the SSC crowd is getting.
One word of advise, though, as a former college official, I have been amazed this season how few fouls have been called on us because of our pressing defensive style of play. I can tell you this for a fact, referees are human and they talk. There is no place in college ball for the constant mouthing off and we will soon find out when we get a head referee that tells his crew before the game to stop it from the onset. It could be the turning point in a critical game that we will play that changes the outcome…hope it is not in the tourney. The IMMATURITY has to stop…this not only shows us in a bad light, but our opponents will feed off of it as well.
Next up, the Giants of Irvine…I see they are slowly getting their injured back which means they are getting tougher as the season goes. This will be a huge game for us.
GO BOWZ
This is win streak number 1 and 15 more to go counting tournament time. Ask the players if they can do it. Guarans every single one feels they can do it. That’s the mentality you gotta have and I really think if this team can stay healthy they can do it after what they’ve been through. Just like the Pitt game no one gave them a chance. And they nearly beat Wichita State when everyone thought they would get blown out. This team is special and they are on a mission to resurrect Hawaii basketball. Go for the gusto!
If you’ve enjoyed watching this team play on TV, you should really come down and see the games in person.
It’s a visceral experience and I think the team really enjoys and thrives on a good crowd at the arena.
It should be a point of pride when you look at some of the glorified gyms they play at on the road.
Now that the squad is back to full strength, I love their chances against Irvine.
Having Nevels and NWC back makes a big difference.
Runbows…
Interesting point about Jankovic getting fouls at an increasing rate. It seems that although the other Stefan – Jovanovic plays more aggressive defense than Janks, Janks gets called for WAY more fouls than Jovanovic.
Last game, Benjy started the Twin Towers:
*Bobbitt
*Nevels
*Valdes
*Jankovic
*Jovanovic
I’m wondering if Benjy is going to stick to this lineup or change it game by game depending on the matchups every week. I’m thinking that he’s going to KEEP Jankovic in primarily for his offense and his upside… but I’m a little surprised Jovanovic is getting starts too.
In the radio post-game Taylor said they practiced with the same two platoon squads that they started the game with. He said it created a nice environment at practice where everybody was really competitive but still urging each other on at the same time, knowing that they’d start the game that way. I think he said the 2nd unit actually beat the first unit in practice.
Would be interesting to see if he tries this again against Irvine. Now that they’re back at full strength, I think they could have enough depth to wear some teams down with a constant pressing D and lots of fresh bodies.
The Wahine pulled out their game, even though they had a hard time stopping #44, 6′ 3″, Doherty and #11, 6′ 1″ Beyer, i think, inside .They kept going across the lane near the basket and putting up short baskets. I only saw the 2nd half and Connie couldn’t seem to stop the big girl much from doing that. Huff was a little better. And then the Wahine neutralized that somehow later in the half.
The Warriors had a hard time with the UC Davis big men inside too, such as with Monson and Ritchart , i think. They kept putting up baskets close in but then that was kind of neutralized some. Same trouble with Brian Bennet of Cal Poly.
Only answer was / is to switch off and double team or more the big ladies or men inside at times or ?
UH Men had 38 points of turnovers to 6 for Cal Poly. Wahine had 19 vs. 5 for Cal Poly.
s/b ” … 38 points off turnovers”
Nice to mention Riley and moment of silence for Ah Chew Goo before the game.
They could have also mentioned Ray Nagel, former AD, who helped keep Men’s basketball alive, 1976 to 83 , among other things .
Welcome back Garret Nevels. Some how I think his presence in last night’s game made some what of a difference.
Go Warriors!
That on ball pressure of the guards bringing up the ball, if Irvine Panics and UH has the bigs cover down low, if Irvine breaks pressure, True, UH as depth at guards and wings, even the bigs active hands and feet, to turnover Irvine 24x with 10 steals or more, for double digit scores.. One thing Mamadou, if he plays, and their 4 other 6’10” to 7’2″ bigs, are not the fastest, Big, however not quick…Last season, the perfect storm, Fotu floating out and hitting 30 pts at Irvine, drifted out 18 feet to the corners, Mamadou could not get there to affect his shot, and Fotu was knocking them down.. Could Janks do same think , or Jovanovich? They have range.. another, thing, if Jovanovich or Janks go right into the body of Mammadou, it neutralizes his length, he will pick up two early fouls I second half. Also, Nevels last year in Irvine, fearless, drove right at Mamadou and his floaters were going in, eventually scoring that 12 foot jumper that secured the win.. And Shamburger miraculous, last hurrah, incredible espn shot, that sent game into overtime.
Completely different team this year, as a team, pressure, quick, and if they can hit their shots, and get the Irvine bigs into foul trouble, not a slow down game, however a well executed game.. only way you win in tournament play post season, half court execution, hitting key shots from Field and FT line and take care of ball.. Hey if UH wins by 1 point or 21 points , we will take it !!
Key, Another Huge , pun intended game.. as long as Team stays, honest, humble, hungry, and keep feeding the hot hand, which is the whole team now…wish so bad, that 8000+ will come out, however you know Hawaii, bedroom and cable , unless for a few of us old folk who cannot walk.. community.. shoots, too bad Jamie was not here, going dorm to dorm, pep rallies, and theme nights, heck, after first 10 minutes of game, if upper sections a lot of seats? JUst open, up, with valid State ID, and or UH system ID and let them in for a dollar.. fill up the top, then they can move down. to lower.. will make noise even louder..
Yes.. UH stay healthy , Humble, Together and Hungry.. this David vs Goliath, reminds me of UH vs Pitt on Maui, as servante stated, no one, even we die hard fans gave UH much of a chance, we hoped however this team getting better game by game.. just have to tighten up lips, and tighten up execution.. from the frenetic, defense, to be able to slow down, in last few minutes and execute for wins at SSC and on the road, that is where, NWC, Nevels, Smith, Bobbitt, and hopefully mature Fleming, Valdes, Thomas, Janks, and Jovanovich, come into play.. Lock down, and turn out the lights. .. UH go for overall win 15, with 11 more BWC regular season games to play, real chance to hit historic, 20 win mark before BWC tournament.. JUst keep the effort, and shoot well.. rebound by committee, and Janks and Jovanovich between them, should get at least 14 boards a game.
Hey this has to be MY favorite team of All time in last 45 years, because of all the adversity..Really proud of UH team and Benjy and Que, Brad and Brandon .. assistants, and shout out to Orthopedic surgeon and Jay Goo, MVP..
Very interesting read by writer from Kaleo paper about slowness of Admin/ power that be to take care of Benjy and his winning MBB team, under the most dire circumstances..Interesting, that is where Mark Takai got his start, his awareness, writing for Kaleo..
Link: http://www.kaleo.org/sports/dropping-the-ball/article_6bfaecc4-a200-11e4-9cda-db7558735025.html
Islandman…
I don’t think Hawaii has ever had a game when they could completely shut down their opponent’s best big man. The one big guy that we partially shut down was Darius Carter of Wichita State. Webster-Chan held him to just 10 points and 6 rebounds. NWC also outrebounded Carter, blocking him out pretty well at times. Darius Carter recently scored 25 points in league play. He’s very good.
When NWC is healthy, he is an underrated defensive player… he may be better known for his 3-pt shooting, but NWC’s got good reach and can defend on the perimeter as well as inside. He hasn’t been playing well as of late… mainly because of illness and lingering injuries… but if he can continue to heal, I think he’s going to help with Hawaii’s interior defense moving forward.
Aside from NWC…
Benjy’s probably hoping that Jovanovic might be his best chance at having a “RIM” protector, with Stefan getting more playing time as of late. But… It’s hard to rely on Nevels and Valdes to help out to double team the opposing big men, since they would leave the 3-pt shooting guards open. I’m thinking that the weak side help could come from Jankovic (or the other forward)… In a perfect world, Jovanovic and Jankovic would play in tandem and provide defensive support for each other… giving our guards the opportunity to force turnovers, and thus, easy transition points.
Runbows…
Thanks for posting that article… great read! It was written by Blake Tolentino… I may be mistaken, but I believe Blake posts occasionally here as xer21. He frequently posts on the Warrior Scout forum as well. He has good hoops insight, and he’s very fair in his comments.
Great win Bows. Just learned that Corey Hawkins is the son of the great Hersey from Philadelphia 76ers. No way to tell if he will end up the same way, but Corey’s story is real similar to … Steph Curry.
Both sons of great NBA 3 point shooters
Both went to small schools (Steph at Davidson, Corey at Riverside) … I wonder how that happened??
Of course Steph lit it up more even in college. But I’m not ready to blow off Corey just yet as “just a shooter”. Steph wasn’t much touted for ballhandling either going to the NBA, but he figured it out (had a 30+ point, 10+ assist, 0 turnover game this year, last one was by Chris Paul a couple years ago). Would be the least surprising thing for an NBA team to give Hawkins a shot, since he’s got the upbringing.
I think it’s safe to say now. Michael Harper made the right decision to go back to Australia. Neither Dyrbe Enos nor Brandon Jawato get any serious playing consideration on this team. Putting them in when we’re down 10 and 60 seconds to play is not serious.
Sadly, I don’t think NWC is going to live up to his hype this year. It’s almost February and he’s still trying to just get healthy. Tough to do that, and play good basketball.
Speaking of fouls, Fleming only had 1! Jovanovic had none I believe, which is also huge. Mike Thomas has improved a lot too when compared to last season, when he would often get into foul trouble despite playing limited minutes.
Just a random note…anyone see Smith’s fake pass to valdes (?) while charging to the basket after he made a steal? It was insane! Crowd gasped in unison. Awesome, slick move by Smith.
Horsse_Champ;
i posted earlier, Jan 20;
Hersey Hawkins and UC Davis coach Jim Les were backcourt teammates at Bradley, per Bobby C. Now their sons, Corey and Tyler are the same at UC Davis.
——————————————————————————————————–
Also, i found that Corey started his career at Arizona St., sat out 2011-12 due to the transfer rule. Could be he transferred at least partly due to his father’s connection to Jim Les.
Jim Les also played in the NBA and other leagues and was an NBA leader in three-point field goal percentage (1991) .
MVC Player of the Year (1986)
Frances Pomeroy Naismith Award (1986).
Irvine will attack UH’s pressure defense, their coach, Russell Turner, said on the radio ( sports animals). But he’s impressed by UH’s talent and athletic ability. He doesn’t grumble about the travel to Hawaii, said UH has to do it more each conference season ( five times this year), while they do it only once.
He said he knows UH’s defense is based on smelling fear from the opponent or something, which he knows about and participated in when he played as a youth. Same thing Fleming said last night in the post game show – the lockdown defense.
Mamadou is on the trip, but will not play. Turner has one of Doc Rivers’ sons on his roster, Spencer Rivers, who is red shirting this season. Said he knows Benji and they are from neighboring states, Virginia and N. Carolina.
HORSSSSE: FYI, Harper transferred to Simon Fraser University, where he started the first 15 games (did not start in the last game) and is averaging 10 points and 4 rebounds.
Islandman…
Yup… it was a pretty interview with Turner… the whole Sports Animal show today was pretty good actually… I also enjoyed the David Hallums interview as well.
3 Things I noticed:
*Balance: the one thing that’s very noticeable is their balance on offense…They have a 4-way tie for leading scorers… with all 4 averaging 11 points a game.
*I was surprised to see that they rank 2nd in the Big West in 3-point shooting (Souza, Martin, and Young are deadly)
*I was equally surprised to see that they ranked only 7th in the Big West in rebounding… despite their size… (the only teams averaging less rebounds were Long Beach and UC Davis).
BOTTOM LINE: I think UC Davis had a little more time to prepare for Hawaii than Irvine does… and you do need time to prepare for Hawaii, I’m sure. Besides, No Mamadou. Sorry. I smell a blowout tomorrow. Just my opinion.
Hmmm…
Just watched a repeat of the Irvine / CSUN off my Roku (WATCH ESPN)… with Irvine destroying CSUN 80 – 49.
My takeaways:
1. Against Irvine, CSUN offered NO DEFENSIVE resistance full court nor half court… none. Irvine guards basically walked the ball into the half court. Irvine guards will have their hands full tomorrow night against the “panic” defense of Hawaii.
2. Irvine’s strength is their interior defense… they’ve got some big guys, even without Mamadou. CSUN’s main source of scoring is inside baskets. Unfortunately, Irvine’s interior defense was a BAD matchup for CSUN. Hicks and Maxwell couldn’t buy open looks… and CSUN guards cannot shoot threes, despite Irvine’s “average at best” perimeter defense. On the other hand, almost ALL of Hawaii’s players love shooting 3’s (except for Stefan Jovanovic). Hawaii should be able to solve Irvine’s zone.
3. Just arriving to Hawaii this afternoon, Irvine has little time to truly prepare for Hawaii’s defense and Hawaii’s style of play, and they’ll be a little tired from the travel. On a neutral court and time to prepare, Irvine CAN beat Hawaii. Tomorrow night, Hawaii SHOULD be a matchup problem for Irvine.
I have a good feeling.
The little basketball have straub bone and join center on them. Ned to remind the students that there are cameras watching them. They should also post security watchers there as well.
As for Irvine game, UH has to execute and make their shots, close to high 40% or near 50 %, and continue that pressure defense, that guard Nelson from England is pretty good, can see him breaking pressure and throwing to a Big, or forward, near top of the key, and the guy has two on one, and goes to basket for Irvine, the way to beat pressure, have a lot of two on ones, one on ones, or one on nones,..I don’t know, UH has been competitive in every game , including BYU game on the road, short NWC and Janks, until they ran out of gas.. If UH can score off of their pressure and in half court, .. should be able to win.. most important they shoot well.. Defense is there, now .. Know that Benjy will mix in some zone too.. anything to get win.. !!
Should be good game, wish UH the best.. hope good crowd.. Home games , only 5 more left !!
Go Bows !!
Also.. UH.. get the loose balls, every rebound can, on O and D glass.. will help towards winning..Just every aspect of ball game..
Mammadou, I suspect even though coach says will not suit up, I bet he plays.. However, I am sure UH would like nothing better than to go at the biggest NCAA DI center in the nation..bad feet or not.
Go Bows !!
🙂
RunBows: Nelson impressed me last season as a freshman. Thought he played well beyond his years. He could prove to be troublesome. Thankfully, the return of Nevels and BWC comes at an opportune time. No more injuries/illnesses ….
clyde: One thing has changed since beginning of season, emergence of Janks as offensive threat, a good one, of course Nevels back, even though not 100%, and besides the guys up top putting on that pressure, really a thing of beauty, AND the bigs, Janks, Jovanovich, NWC, Thomas, back line help, they are getting deflections steals and doubling guys to help.. It is becoming a Team Pressure Panic defense, remember Cal Poly, was leading the nation in fewest turnovers? UH turned them over 18x, CSUN 28x, Riverside 23x, Davis 24x, Wichita St, I think it was 18 or 19x, .. This team , they are fearless… don’t know if Irvine, has faced a team with the quicks that UH has.. on defense, and now offense they are really focused.. Hope Team is just ready mentally and keep quiet.. don’t get involved in dialouge with other team or referees, could cost them the game..
Go Bows.. and Just figure out way to win..by 1 or 21, or forfeit.. Just the W !! Win another one for the Ole Red head Riley Wallace, get better Coach !!
🙂
clyde, should be a great game UH effort will be there from opening tipoff till final buzzer, guaranteed, and Janks has to watch the ticky tack fouls, cannot afford him getting into early foul trouble, however maybe Jovanovich starts stepping out and hitting his 17 foot jumpers..TEam Wins.. any which way.. we shall see.. hope 8000 do show up !!