After back-to-back seasons as Big West Conference champion, Hawaii women’s basketball coach Laura Beeman wants to see her team play like one for an entire season.
The Rainbow Wahine open the season with their lone exhibition game against Hawaii Hilo tonight at SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center.
Seven days before the official season opener on the road at No. 15 Stanford, fans are invited to watch a UH team returning 11 letterwinners, including three who earned all-conference honors.
“I want to see if we are a team that can get ahead, stay ahead, and put our foot down ever harder,” Beeman said Tuesday. “Not taking away from Hilo in any way, shape or form, but this is a game we should win. We know that. Are we going to get on top, stay on top throughout the entire game or are we going to watch the scoreboard and allow that to affect our intensity on both sides of the ball? I think that’s the biggest challenge for this group right now.”
Last season, UH rebounded from a 1-7 start and caught fire at the end, winning four of its last five regular-season games, and then three straight in the conference tourney to be crowned champs.
The victories earned UH a game in the NCAA Tournament against eventual national champion LSU.
This year, even with a nonconference schedule that includes road games at No. 4 UCLA and Santa Clara, as well as a home game against a Washington team receiving votes in the Top 25, the early-season goal is to get off to a much better start.
“It’s always the first thing we talk about. We mention last year and the slow start we got off to,” sophomore forward Imani Perez said Tuesday. “We don’t want it to happen this year. Sometimes it can get to your head and gets to you all over, but I think our team is ready to start out strong.”
Perez closed out her first season with the Rainbow Wahine exactly like that, strong, earning All-Big West freshman team honors after starting eight of the final nine games and averaging 8.6 points and 6.0 rebounds in those games.
One of four players to play in all 33 games last season, Perez showed a durability and a toughness that proved crucial in crunch time.
“I just think as a player I went in (to the season) a little scared because my first thought was always, ‘I don’t want to mess up,” said the 6-foot-4, Denver native. “You realize practice is your time to mess up because the game is going to be like practice. Those last few games I just knew I was ready for those challenges that were brought to me.”
With all of the returning experience, UH has only one senior on the roster in guard Ashley Thomas, who averaged 13 minutes a game last season.
Leading scorer Lily Wahinekapu and fellow guard Daejah Phillips, the only two players to average more than 30 minutes a game a year ago, are back as selections to the preseason All-Big West Conference team.
Hawaii also added size and depth to the roster with incoming transfer Brooklyn Rewers, a 6-foot-4 forward from Michigan State, and three freshmen.
Guard Olivia Davies is back after she was limited to three games last season due to injury.
“The girls are definitely tired of banging on each other. They are ready to show our stuff against somebody else,” Beeman said. “Any time you can get additional games on your schedule against competition, it helps prepare you for this opening road trip.”
Rainbow Wahine basketball
Who: Hawaii Hilo (0-0) vs. Hawaii (0-0)
When: Tonight, 7 p.m.
Where: SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center
TV: None
Radio: KKEA 1420-AM / 97. 5 FM
