ANNAPOLIS, Md. » There was one fairly solid phase through most of this winless season for the University of Hawaii football team.
Special teams.
After Saturday’s 42-28 loss here at Navy we can’t really say that anymore.
The kicking game kicked Hawaii in the posterior, with a fumbled punt that Navy immediately turned into a touchdown and two missed field goals of 36 and 27 yards. This all happened in three consecutive possessions (well, if you count having your hands on a punt less than a second before fumbling it a possession).
That’s 13 points right there. Toss in a 27.7 average on three punts and an anemic return game where the long on punts was 5 yards and 25 on kickoffs and there you have it — tremendous offensive performances by UH’s Joey Iosefa and Sean Schroeder frittered away.
Now, you can say quarterback Keenan Reynolds’ 226 yards, rushing including four touchdowns is what won the game for Navy. But the kicking game lost it for Hawaii.
UH’s defense was far from great. But if the special teams did their part, as they had most games leading up to this ninth loss, the Rainbow Warriors would have led at halftime instead of being tied, and then things are very different.
When you fall behind Navy by two TDs like UH did in the third quarter it’s like trailing ‘Iolani in basketball by 10 points — you’re lucky if you get the ball back more than a couple of times, and you’d better cash in every time.
As they always do, the Warriors kept fighting despite their mess-ups, clawing back, keeping contact, matching TDs. Hawaii was finally operating on offense the way coach Norm Chow wants — a big, bruising back gaining big chunks of yards and setting up play-action when the linebackers and safeties cheat up.
Iosefa put up Travis Sims-like numbers, and Schroeder’s stat line looked like something from Colt Brennan, circa 2006.
But as we’ve seen many times with this team, good fortune takes spirit-killing 180-degree turns with regularity — sometimes on the very same play. Case in point: the apparent interception by John Hardy-Tuliau negated by a roughing the passer call.
The call was questionable, and I’m not saying that’s why the referee got hurt a few plays later and left the game … I’m just saying that’s what happened.
If you’re against Chow you will find other things to grouse about, so maybe you can agree he and Jordan Wynn did some nice things when it came to play-calling. Of course, those play-action passes worked because Navy was wary and weary of Iosefa pounding up the middle yet again. But they still had to be executed well, and they were.
Ken Niumatalolo made what could’ve been a crucial mistake in going for a TD late in the third quarter from the 1-foot line instead of knocking through a short field goal that would’ve made it 31-14 — a three-score difference (which might as well be 62-14 against Navy’s discipline and ball-hogging offense).
But UH took a page out of the Midshipmen’s playbook and marched 99 yards, taking 18 plays and 5:51 to do it. The only problem with that is Navy struck back in two plays — and UH, still trailing, could not win in this role reversal of ground-and-pound and quick strike.
If the special teams had not erred so terribly early on? Hawaii would’ve been in the lead, and its newly found ball-control offense in the second half would’ve been a beautiful thing.
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Reach Dave Reardon at dreardon@staradvertiser.com or 529-4783 and read his Quick Reads blog at staradvertiser.com/quickreads
