Wahine set sights on Big West tourney

The Hawaii women’s basketball team is thinking big picture.

The chances of a Rainbow Wahine Big West regular-season championship are looking increasingly slim, so Laura Beeman’s squad has its sights set on the conference tournament in Anaheim, Calif., in less than two weeks.

Third-place UH (14-12, 10-5 BWC) begins its three-game homestand at 5 p.m. against Cal State Northridge at the Stan Sheriff Center as part of a doubleheader with the UH men’s hoops team.

Big West leader Pacific (22-6, 12-4) and second-place Cal Poly (17-9, 11-4) need to lose multiple times for the Wahine to get a superior seed and a double-bye to the semifinals. Both teams were victorious on Thursday while UH was idle, further denting the Wahine’s dwindling regular-season title hopes.

Beeman won’t be heartbroken if UH remains in third. That position would still afford a bye to the tournament’s second round.

"Right now, we’re looking at the 3, and I’m really OK with that," Beeman said. "You get a game, you get a day off, then you get two. I think that bodes well for our team."

UH bested Northridge 65-53 on Feb. 2. At 5-4, the Wahine finished with their first winning conference road record since 2005-06. But that hasn’t been enough for the inside track to the team’s first regular-season title since 1997-98.

"I think we would love to be first, obviously, but the cards are pretty much out of our hands right now," point guard Monica DeAngelis said. "So we can only take care of the next three games that we have. We can only hope those two teams lose, but we have no control of that.

"We’re in it now to win the tournament. That’s our goal."

Junior forward Kamilah Martin continues to lead the way with 15.1 points and 9.9 rebounds per game. She is third in the Big West in scoring and second in rebounding.

UH’s offense was stagnant (48.5 points per game) in its split of last week’s road trip to UC Santa Barbara and Cal Poly. Beeman was thankful for some extra preparation time during this single-game week.

"We cleaned some things up," Beeman said. "We know our defense is on point. So we just have to get as good on offense as we are on defense, and that will make us a better team."

Kalani High graduate Violet Alama is a senior for Northridge (13-14, 7-8), averaging 6.1 points and 6.2 rebounds.

UH team manager Janelle Nomura has today’s matchup circled on her calendar. The Punahou product played two seasons at Northridge before transferring home after the 2010-11 season with the goal of playing before friends and family.

That goal was cut short; she would have played point guard for UH this season but for a career-ending concussion in the offseason.

UH is 7-3 in its last 10 home games, with the three losses all coming by a point — Utah (62-61), Alabama (44-43) and UC Santa Barbara (51-50).