In the end, the Hawaii basketball team had the drive but could not sink the close shots in Thursday’s 68-66 road loss to UC Davis in University Credit Union Center in Davis, Calif.
A crowd of 1,478 saw the Rainbow Warriors miss two layups in the final seconds, including Tanner Christensen’s putback as time expired. The ’Bows fell to 12-7 overall and 4-4 in the Big West. By winning for the fourth time in five games, the Aggies improved to 12-8 and 6-3.
“We had a chance to win a road game against a hot team,” UH coach Eran Ganot said. “We didn’t get it done. We can point to certain areas. Their start and their effort on the glass. We ended up being plus-eight (in rebounds) but they were plus-five or six at one point. We’ve got to be more consistent. The possession difference in terms of turnovers has been a problem for us all year.”
Relying on a sequence of defensive schemes — press, zone press, zone and man-to-man — the Aggies scored 13 of the game’s first 20 points, then opened the second half with an 8-2 run to expand a 25-23 lead to 33-25 with 17:49 to play.
The ’Bows were able to navigate through the web of defensive pressures and feed 6-foot-9 reserve Harry Rouhliadeff, who scored 17 of his career-high 21 points after the intermission.
The ’Bows took a 66-65 lead when Christensen hit one of two free throws with 52.3 seconds to play.
The Aggies worked the ball to guard TY Johnson, whose 18-foot jumper over Kody Williams’ outstretched arms gave UCD a 67-66 lead with 33.8 seconds remaining.
On UH’s ensuing possession, Williams tried to pass from the right corner to Christensen. But Johnson stole the pass, went coast to coast, and was fouled on a shot attempt with 7.5 seconds to go. Johnson missed the first free throw but made the second to make it 68-66.
During a timeout, the ’Bows planned to give the ball to speedy guard Marcus Greene. The transfer from Houston Christian missed his three shots in the first half. But he had drained a 3 to tie it at 63 with 2:23 left in the second half.
“In the first half, he had some great look that didn’t go in,” Ganot said of Greene. “We were talking to him: ‘Hey, that’s great offense. Those are good shots. You’re a good shooter. You start to hesitate that’ll hurt you and us.’ I’m glad he continued to be aggressive and hit a big one late.”
Greene took the inbounds pass and drove the length of the court. But his layup attempt would not fall. Christensen rebounded the miss, but his two-handed putback was too strong as time expired.
“You can’t get better shots,” Ganot said. “Those were good shots. We’ll make the next ones.”
Of the final sequence, Ganot said, “it was 7 1/2 seconds. It was plenty of time. … We felt we could get (Greene) on the run. He did a great job. He got on the run. He got to the rim. And we got a shot at the rim. … I felt good about the shots we got. We’ll put our focus on the areas during the game that really hurt us.”
Ganot said the Aggies’ presses often delayed the ’Bows in operating their offense. “We were really on our heels and playing late clock,” Ganot said. “We were fortunate to make some late-clock plays.”
The ’Bows also had 13 turnovers, including seven in the second half that were parlayed into 13 points. The Aggies committed only five turnovers.
“You can’t throw away possessions like we do,” Ganot said. “We didn’t finish well at the rim, like we usually do. We missed some open shots. But that turnover differential has hurt us this year.”
BIG WEST MEN
Conference Overall
W L Pct. GB W L
UC Irvine 7 1 .875 — 17 3
UC San Diego 6 2 .750 1 16 4
UC Davis 6 3 .667 11
2 12 8
CS Northridge 5 3 .625 2 13 6
UC Riverside 5 3 .625 2 12 8
UCSB 4 4 .500 3 12 7
Hawaii 4 4 .500 3 12 7
CSU Bakersfield 4 4 .500 2 10 10
Long Beach St. 3 5 .375 4 7 13
CS Fullerton 1 8 .111 61
2 6 15
Cal Poly 0 8 .000 7 6 14
Thursday
UC Davis 68, Hawaii 66
UC Riverside 84, UC Irvine 80
CS Bakersfield 71, CS Fullerton 68
CS Northridge 86, Long Beach State 76
UC San Diego 77, UC Santa Barbara 63
Saturday
Hawaii at UC Irvine, 5 p.m.
Long Beach State at Cal Poly
UC Santa Barbara at Cal State Fullerton
UC Riverside at Cal State Bakersfield
Cal State Northridge at UC San Diego
UC DAVIS 68, HAWAII 66
RAINBOW WARRIORS ( 12-7, 4-4)
NO. PLAYER MIN FG-A 3PT FT-A O-DREB TREB PF A TO BLK STL PTS
32 Christensen 27 2-5 0-0 7-9 5-3 8 2 1 2 0 0 11
00 Williams 33 2-13 2-7 4-4 0-6 6 2 5 2 1 0 10
22 Rapp 23 2-3 1-2 5-5 2-2 4 3 1 1 1 1 10
05 Nemeikša 17 2-6 0-3 0-0 2-3 5 2 0 1 0 0 4
02 Beattie, 20 1-1 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 3 1 4 0 1 2
14 Rouhliadeff 24 8-14 2-4 3-3 3-4 7 3 1 1 0 0 21
04 Greene 22 1-6 1-5 1-2 0-3 3 1 0 0 1 0 4
30 Hunkin-Claytor 16 1-3 1-1 0-0 0-1 1 3 2 0 0 0 3
34 Jacobs, Akira 18 0-2 0-1 1-2 0-1 1 0 0 0 0 0 1
TEAM 0 0-0 0-0 0-0 3-1 4 0 0 2 0 0 0
Totals 200 19-53 7-23 21-25 15-24 39 19 11 13 3 2 66
AGGIES (12-8, 6-3 )
NO. PLAYER MIN FG-A 3PT FT-A O-DREB TREB PF A TO BLK STL PTS
02 Johnson 38 9-19 0-2 5-8 0-3 3 2 4 3 1 3 23
08 Tamba 29 9-12 0-0 1-4 2-3 5 1 1 1 1 1 19
04 Sevilla 31 3-8 3-5 2-2 0-0 0 1 0 0 0 0 11
10 DeBruhl 34 3-12 0-1 3-4 0-2 2 4 2 1 0 0 9
07 Rocak 23 1-3 0-0 0-0 3-6 9 5 2 0 2 1 2
01 Daughtery Jr., 21 1-3 1-1 0-0 1-3 4 1 0 0 0 0 3
36 Cooper 11 0-0 0-0 1-2 1-2 3 2 0 0 0 0 1
20 Chappell, 8 0-1 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 3 1 0 0 0 0
05 Roberson 3 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
11 Mani,Jac 2 0-0 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0
TEAM 0 0-0 0-0 0-0 3-2 5 0 0 0 0 0 0
Totals 200 26-58 4-9 12-20 10-21 31 21 10 5 4 5 68
Halftime — UC Davis 25, Hawaii 23
Technical fouls — Hawaii: None. UCD: Rocak. Officials — Layne Barney, Jeff Campbell,
Robert Lehigh. A — 1,478.
