Goo ain't too proud to beg for some offense

By Ann Miller
Advertiser Staff Writer

There was a point in Saturday's basketball loss at Tulsa that University of Hawai'i Rainbow Wahine coach Vince Goo pleaded with the referees to call a shooting foul.

His team was not making much else. It missed its first 10 shots and hit but 20 percent for the half. In its four road losses it is averaging just 50 points and shooting 33 percent.

Those numbers rise 20 percent at home, but tonight 10th-ranked Louisiana Tech provides the truest test of the Western Athletic Conference season at Stan Sheriff Center.

The Techsters (17-2 overall, 9-0 WAC) have won their last 15 and dropped just one WAC game since joining the conference last year. They are among the Top 20 nationally in defense and field-goal percentage defense.

So are the Rainbow Wahine (11-7, 5-4 WAC), whose defense held up on the road even as its offense went up in flames. Tulsa hit just 16 percent of its second-half shots and Goo came home insisting his team still had a shot at the top of the WAC.

"If you go out on the road and lose by 20 you could be really discouraged," Goo said. "But when you put things in perspective ... if we even made one more basket in either game, it's as simple as that.

"The problem is mostly at the offensive end. As a coach I've got to be pretty happy that we played consistent defense every night. That shows character. We don't need 20 more points, we just need six or seven more or maybe just two more at the right time."

They need to give themselves that opportunity tonight, and Saturday against Southern Methodist. In the second half of the season, UH plays all four teams it lost to at home. Goo considers those the toughest teams in a remarkably balanced WAC.

He hasn't touched his defense this week. All he really wants to see now is the ball going in the basket. His players see it in their sleep, but need to do it with their eyes open.

"In the Tulsa game we executed very well, we just couldn't finish the shot," Jade Abele said.

"It felt like we could do everything," Natasja Allen agreed. "We just couldn't execute the shot."

The loss of Janka Gabrielova, Karena Greeny and Chelsea Wagner from last year's team has hurt. Gabrielova's offense was erratic but she was capable of scoring in bunches. Greeny was the WAC's best 3-point shooter and Wagner Hawai'i's best pure shooter.

But Louisiana Tech also lost three starters and brought in its biggest recruiting class ever (eight). It is still shooting down the WAC and has proved to be the only team good enough to win on the road. It is going for its 200th conference (including two previous affiliations) win tonight, against 13 losses.

"We have to come out with a little spark on offense," Allen says. "We can't care if they are No. 10, we have to take it to them and show they can't overlook a little school in the middle of the ocean."

OVER AND BACK: In their 29-year history, the Techsters have won three national titles, been to 13 final fours and are second in all-time victories to Tennessee.