Savovic leads Green squad to Midnight 'Ohana win

By Dayton Morinaga
Advertiser Staff Writer

The theme of last night's Midnight 'Ohana for the Hawai'i basketball team was loosely based around the "Survivor" reality-based television show.

By the end of the night — actually early this morning — Predrag Savovic proved his worth at outplaying and outlasting his opponents.

Savovic scored a game-high 16 points to lead the Green to a 34-28 overtime victory over the White in an intrasquad scrimmage that was the highlight of the Coors Light Midnight Ohana. The annual event opens the practice season for the UH basketball teams.

"Every time we play, we take it serious," said Savovic, a senior guard. "It's kind of entertaining, but we have to get serious. It's the beginning of the year."

Savovic was the leading scorer on last year's team that finished 17-14 and won the Western Athletic Conference Tournament championship.

Last night, he scored four crucial points in the closing minutes of regulation, and then the tie-breaking basket in overtime.

"For a game like this, I would have liked to see him pass more," UH coach Riley Wallace said. "But he's a competitor and he wants to win and he showed it."

The White led by as many 26-19 with less than four minutes remaining in regulation, but the Green mounted a furious rally behind Savovic. Back-to-back breakaway lay-ups by Savovic cut the deficit to 26-23, then a 3-pointer by Mark Campbell tied it with 0.4 seconds remaining.

Wallace was impressed with Campbell, a junior college transfer who is expected to take over point guard duties for UH this season.

"Mark doesn't shoot a lot, but he gets the ball to other guys and brings the ball up against pressure," Wallace said. "And then he took that big shot and hit it, so he looked good."

The Green scored the first eight points of the 2-minute overtime to seize control.

Phil Martin led the White with 11 points and four rebounds, while Mike McIntyre added nine points.

The women's team defeated the men in a 3-point challenge before the men's intrasquad scrimmage. Each team chose five players to take five shots each. The score was tied, 15-15, after the fifth round, but April Atuaia of the Wahine beat Mike McIntyre, 4-3, in a tie-breaking shoot-off. Other members of the winning women's team were Christa Brossman, Michelle Gabriel, Milia Macfarlane and Arijana Sijercic. The men's team consisted of McIntyre, Carl English, Mindaugas Burneika, Predrag Savovic and Paul Jesinskis.

Newcomer Luc-Arthur Vebobe, a 6-9 junior from France, won the slam-dunk contest. His winning dunk was a windmill jam off a bounce pass to himself. English, last year's dunk champ, placed second.