At the halfway point of the regular season, the Hawaii football team is making the charts.
Slotback John Ursua leads the nation with 130.6 receiving yards per game. Running back Diocemy Saint Juste is third with 892 rushing yards and fifth with 148.7 rushing yards per game.
But self-inflicted mistakes are overshadowing those achievements. The Rainbow Warriors are 116th (out of 129 FBS schools) in total defense, allowing 474.2 yards per game. And they have earned a flag-football reputation, amassing 523 penalty yards in six games (128th nationally). The Warriors are 123rd with 9.33 penalties per game.
“Too many penalties,” head coach Nick Rolovich lamented after the Warriors were flagged 11 times for 114 yards in a 35-21 loss to Nevada this past weekend. “We lost our cool.”
The offense has accounted for 39 of the Warriors’ 56 penalties this season. The offense is averaging 6.5 infractions and 58.0 penalty yards per game. Against Nevada, UH’s offensive linemen were penalized five times, costing the Warriors 108 yards in potential yards, including Saint Juste’s nullified 84-yard run.
“We have a big run by Diocemy, and it has to come back,” Ursua said. “That kind of stuff impacts the way we think and the momentum and the game.”
The Warriors, who last won against FCS member Western Carolina on Sept. 2, are now 2-4 overall and 0-3 in the Mountain West Conference. They need to win four of their final six regular-season games to qualify for a berth in the Hawaii Bowl. Their other goal, a West Division title, appears to be out of reach. San Diego State and Fresno State are atop the division with 2-0 MW records. But San Diego State appears to have an easier cross-over schedule. The Aztecs’ Mountain Division opponents are a combined 7-8; the Warriors’ cross-over opponents are 10-7.
“We’re going to learn from this and move on,” Rolovich said. “This is turning on us pretty quick. All we’re going to have is ourselves in the locker room.”
Offensive lineman J.R. Hensley said: “We had a rough couple weeks, and it’s what we do from here on out. We can’t look back. The wound is still fresh, and it’s going to be on our minds. And we still have to watch film. But at the end of the day, we have to rally around each other.”
