Every Sunday, “Back in the Day” looks at an article that ran on this date in the Honolulu Star-Bulletin. The items are verbatim, so don’t blame us today for yesteryear’s bad grammar.
Living on Tulsa time left most of the University of Hawaii Rainbows looking at the clock and wondering if the fourth quarter would ever end.
Even though they had dominated the Oklahoma independents in a 38-9 rout Saturday night before an Aloha Stadium crowd of 35,217, the Rainbows knew they had been in a very hard-hitting game.
It was just the kind of football UH head coach Bob Wagner wanted for his 9-2 Rainbows, who are only one win away from adding another chapter to this already-historic 1992 season.
If the Rainbows beat Pittsburgh this Saturday night at Aloha Stadium, the 10-2 regular season record will be the best in the Hawaii books.
The Rainbows already are the first UH team to share a Western Athletic Conference title in football, and the first group to be going to a mainland bowl game. Hawaii faces Illinois on Dec. 30 as the WAC champions in the Thrifty Car Rental Holiday Bowl.
After securing that bowl bid last week in an emotional win over Wyoming, it wasn’t surprising to see Hawaii walking a flat line against a Golden Hurricane team that already had faced Texas A&M, Houston, Kansas and Oklahoma State this year.
It proved to be a physical contest filled with three fumbles by UH running back Travis Sims, two erratic pitches by Rainbow quarterback Michael Carter and two UH interceptions against two Tulsa quarterbacks.
It wasn’t pretty. In fact, it got sloppy from time to time as the combined 10 fumbles and two interceptions would indicate. But when it got down to it in the second half, Hawaii survived the no-huddle concept of the Hurricane, while Tulsa closed out a disappointing season at 4-7.
"Our guys always show up to play," said Tulsa head coach Dave Rader. "There were some good hits out there and our guys didn’t back down at all.
"This was a good Hawaii football team and we’ve played some very good teams this year. …
"If I had to compare them, I’d say they’re probably very similar to Houston. Hawaii is playing with a lot of confidence now. If you make mistakes, they’re very tough to stop."
