North Texas routs Warriors, 68-51
Jorden Duffy scored 13 points and grabbed seven rebounds and Jahmiah Simmons added 13 points and four boards tonight to help visiting North Texas blitz past Hawai’i, 68-51, for the Outrigger Resorts Rainbow Classic championship.
A stunned crowd of about 4,200 watched Ryan Woolridge add 12 points and eight rebounds as the Mean Green improved to 4-0. Zigmars Raimo scored 14 points and grabbed seven rebounds and Drew Buggs added 12 points, six boards and four assists to lead the Warriors, who fell to 2-1.
North Texas jumped out to leads of 7-0, 12-2 and 17-4 in the first nine minutes and never looked back, out-playing UH in virtually every phase. After the Warriors closed it to 24-15 on Jack Purchase’s two free throws with 4:35 remaining in the first half, the Mean Green responded with an 11-4 run to close out the half with a 35-17 lead.
Purchase opened the second half with 3-pointer from the left wing, but Umoja Gibson answered immediately with his own 3-pointer just 14 seconds later and Hawai’i could never close the gap to less than 16 points the rest of the game.
The Warriors’ next game is scheduled for November 18, when they host Northern Arizona, 5:00 p.m. at the Sheriff Center.
More details, including video highlights and interviews, will be posted later.
Outrigger Resorts Rainbow Classic
Sunday’s Result
North Texas 68, Hawai’i 51
Final tournament records
North Texas 3-0
Hawai’i 2-1
Humboldt State 0-2
Portland 0-2
North Texas team very far away from home. Not big team. Good point guard. Good pressure defense. .Their best player on the bench with injury. Wow. Good benchmark this early in season. Warriors beat Portland not that great a team, and rout DII Humboldt St. Real wake up call for Eran and team. You know there are a legit bottom 3 teams preseason in Bigwest that are like UH, and top 5 that have upgraded talent. Eran has to continue to upgrade talent from small to bigs. Bring back that excitement to the SSC like Riley had, and another historic team magical run. Similar to what Rolo is going through. I think Warriors will finish preseason 7-7,and BWC regular season 8-8, get to semi of BWC and lose. finish season at 16-16 and if Matlin and Athletic dept . have the monies, host CIT game here at SSC. If team can compete. Young bigs, wings, This North Texas team very small, however they played Warriors perfectly to get win in RBC championship game. I hope I am wrong, however, I hope Eran is going 24-7 to get some talent, from 1 through 15 on the roster , the other BWC teams are constantly getting better, with some facilities getting upgraded too. That is my final two cents worth. Go Warriors. Get better week by week. They have to be grinders and smart to get it done agains all the Athletic teams they will meet in next 4 months !!