It’s little things. A lot of little things that continue to add up in a big way.

A breakdown on perimeter defense. A lack of aggressiveness on the defensive boards. Turnovers.

Things easily pointed out, less easily explained.

"I wish I had an answer," Hawaii senior guard Megan Tinnin said last night. "We need to figure it out what’s hurting us or it’s going to be a very long season."

For the fifth consecutive year, the Rainbow Wahine find themselves playing from behind early in the Western Athletic Conference basketball race after dropping the league opener. New Mexico State (7-8, 1-0), with four players in double figures, pulled way for a 74-58 win at the Stan Sheriff Center.

Hawaii (6-8, 0-1) has little time to make big adjustments, hosting Louisiana Tech (9-5, 1-0) tomorrow at 5 p.m. The Lady Techsters blew out San Jose State last night 69-34.

"We don’t have time to feel sorry for ourselves," Wahine coach Dana Takahara-Dias said. "We need to learn from this and move on.

"I really give credit to New Mexico State. They made great plays, they played really great defense. We did a lot of things not so well. We’ve got to get a perimeter game going."

That was very obvious last night. The Aggies hit as many treys (seven) as the Wahine attempted.

Tinnin, the program’s 3-point career leader, had Hawaii’s lone long-distance make. Hampered by foul trouble and NMSU’s defense, she had only four attempts from behind the arc.

Conversely, the Aggies were 7-for-19, led by senior guard Danisha Corbett’s three. Senior guard Madison Spence, daughter of the NMSU coach, added two in the second half that helped stretch what had been a three-point halftime lead (36-33) to 14 (66-52) with 3:17 left.

"Our guards are as good as anybody’s," Aggies coach Darin Spence said after his team snapped a five-game losing skid. "Our inside game has gotten better and we wanted to be more efficient in the second half.

"If you turn the ball over, you can’t score. We’re learning to be more efficient on offense."

Tabytha Wampler led the Aggies with 17 points, Jasmine Lowe added 16, Madison Spence 14 and Corbett 13. NMSU also was efficient from the free-throw line, going 15-for-18.

Keisha Kanekoa led the Wahine with 17 points and Kamilah Jackson, who didn’t take a shot until 5 minutes into the game, finished with 12. Hawaii had one of its better nights from the line (15-for-20); UH came into the game as the worst free-throw shooting team in the WAC (62.9 percent).

The Aggies used an 8-0 spurt midway through the first half to break a 12-all tie to take the lead for good at 20-12. Lowe and Corbett hit on back-to-back 3s to spark the run, two of NMSU’s four treys of the opening 20 minutes.

Corbett’s third 3-pointer of the half gave the Aggies their biggest lead (34-24) with 3:46 to go. The Wahine refused to go away, closing the half on a 9-2 run, capped by Shawna Kuehu’s fast-break layup that beat the buzzer and narrowed the gap to 36-33.

Hawaii would get no closer. The Wahine were outscored 38-25 in the second half.

"We’re right there and then we lose it," said Tinnin, who grew up in New Mexico. "It was frustrating to me personally. I hate losing to them. Hopefully, we will learn from this."

Note

With her 17 points, Kanekoa (1,040) passed Tondi Redden (1,023) for 14th place on UH’s career scoring list. Jade Abele is No. 13 (1.057).