This was not UH we knew

By Ferd Lewis
Advertiser Staff Columnist

DALLAS — The University of Hawai'i basketball team went into its locker room at halftime yesterday ... and never came out.

Well, somebody emerged. A bunch of somebodies in green uniforms, actually. But whoever they were — and security tapes will be reviewed — it sure wasn't the Rainbows in a 70-58 NCAA Tournament opening-round loss to Xavier.

Forget what the announcers on CBS might have told you, these were not the Rainbows we had come to know and love in a 27-5 run through all comers. Not the ones who could — and did — light up defenses and arena scoreboards across seven states in the process.

To paraphrase former Texas Sen. Lloyd Bentsen, we know the Rainbows and these, folks, were not them.

Not by a long shot, which was coincidentally what gave them away: their sudden inability to shoot in the second half while watching a seven-point halftime lead and all their shot-making magic disappear.

Even for a program that had gone 0-for-3 in its previous NCAA appearances, this elimination was numbing. "This was the most frustrating one," said Bob Nash, the assistant coach and former Fabulous Five member who had played or coached in them all. "We're a better team than that. That wasn't us out there in the second half. We got away from what got us here."

Even Xavier coach Thad Matta, who had come to know them only by video tape and word-of-mouth reputation, said as much. "That second half was uncharacteristic of the Hawai'i team we watched," Matta said in sworn testimony.

A UH team that has lived by its jump shooting had struggled with it on occasion, too. But invariably Predrag Savovic, Carl English, someone, would hit a 3-pointer and snap the Rainbows out of it. Witness all except the Colorado State and San Jose State games.

But not this time. And never quite like this on a national stage such as this.

The team that, as Matta put it, seemed to have, "so many answers on offense," in the first half had trouble with the questions the Musketeers were posing with a renewed focus on defense in the second half.

The more the Musketeers forced UH out of its jumpshot comfort zone, the more impatient and ragged the Rainbows became. The more they had to handle and pass the ball, the less interest the Rainbows had in doing it. "It wasn't just that the shots were not falling; we were taking bad shots," Savovic acknowledged.

After scoring 40 points in the first half, it was an uphill battle for the Rainbows just to manage 18 in the second. Following near 50 percent shooting — including 46 percent from 3-point range — in the first half, UH was suddenly unable to hit the broadside of the American Airlines Center with 2-of-18 shooting to begin the second half.

I mean, the first 8 minutes, 22 seconds of the second half without so much as a field goal? Twelve second-half turnovers?

The disappearance couldn't have come at a more painful or inopportune time for a team that had dared itself to set high new standard at UH and had accomplished so much during this season of wonder.

As the Rainbows trotted off the court at halftime, TV sung their praises and Oklahoma fans, whose team gets the winner tomorrow, looked restless. Everybody's favorite bracket upset pick was an early-round Cinderella 20 minutes in waiting.

Then, the second half started and, suddenly, the Rainbows we had known were nowhere to be found.