The Hawaii basketball team faces a Titanic challenge when it plays fully loaded Cal State Fullerton today in Titan Gym.
“It’s awesome,” UH coach Eran Ganot said of the first of a two-game road trip in Orange County. “As a competitor, you want to play other teams at their best and at their place.”
On Saturday, the ’Bows defeated winless Cal Poly to end a three-game losing streak, improve to 3-6 in league play, and ascend to the seventh seed for the eight-team Big West Tournament in March.
The Titans, who won the league opener against Hawaii on Dec. 30, have won three in a row.
In that first meeting, the Titans were without their top scorer, guard Max Jones, who averages 16 points per game.
“Max is back on the floor and ready to rock,” CSUF coach Dedrick Taylor said of the 6-foot-4 junior. In eight Big West games, Jones has connected on 50% of his 34 3-point attempts.
“The biggest thing is just health and getting healthy,” Taylor said. “Getting Max and Tory (San Antonio) and DJ (Brewton) on the floor together has been a little bit trivial for us. We finally have been able to hit a stretch to get that and take advantage of what they do for us and how they do it.”
Brewton, a transfer from Alcorn State, is the point in what can expand to a four-guard offense. The Titans have forced 13.1 turnovers per game, including 7.1 steals against Big West opponents. San Antonio, a 6-3 guard, has defended the one through four positions. San Antonio was named the league’s top defensive player last season. He missed eight pre-conference games because of ailments.
“Our team is formed around them in terms of being the defensive-stopping team that we can be,” Taylor said. “And rebounding and getting out in transition, it’s been good to have those bodies available to you. When they are, we can be pretty productive.”
The ’Bows will be playing their third game without 7-foot-1 Mor Seck, who suffered a season-ending ACL injury last week. Harry Rouhliadeff and starting forward Justin McKoy have played the five to alleviate center and co-captain Bernardo da Silva’s workload.
“Bernardo can see extended minutes,” Ganot said. “He’s done it before. We may not have needed to as much in the past.”
Da Silva, who is 6-9 with a 7-2 reach, has logged more minutes in the absence of his top backup. In the first 19 games, da Silva averaged 24 minutes per game. In the two games without Seck, da Silva played 33 minutes, 15 seconds against UC Santa Barbara and 31:26 against Cal Poly.
While da Silva is an effective scorer from the paint and aggressive rim protector, his kryptonite has been his free-throw shooting. He was 10-for-25 from the line the last two games. He was fouled 19 times — sometimes intentionally — in those games. In the first 19 games, he averaged 4.4 free throws, converting at 53%.
“We believe in Bernardo,” Ganot said. “He hit a couple free throws late (against Cal Poly) as well. I think he was better later than earlier in the game. … Eventually a breakthrough will come for him.”
Da Silva said: “The only way I can improve my free throws is to keep shooting more free throws and trying to improve. I felt I missed a lot of free throws. I’ve been working on that. I believe they’ll start falling.”
BIG WEST BASKETBALL
At Titan Gym, Fullerton, Calif.
Hawaii (11-10, 3-6 BIG WEST) at Cal State Fullerton (11-10, 4-5)
>> When: Today at 5 p.m.
>> TV: None
>> Radio: 1420-AM
>> Streaming: ESPN+
