By Ferd Lewis
Advertiser Columnist

It was a Thursday afternoon, study hall was approaching for the University of Hawai'i women's basketball team and guard Trisha Nishimoto asked to be excused for urgent business.

And, not for any of the run-of-the-mill excuses — to do laundry, see a boyfriend, go shopping, etc. — either.

"The first south swell of the summer was coming and she really wanted to go surfing and make up the hour later," said Serenda Valdez, the assistant coach in charge of academics.

The curious thing — for most anybody else, maybe — is that the coaches let her.

But, then, the request was thoroughly in keeping with the free-spirited character the Rainbow Wahine have come to call "our Trish." And it wasn't like there was any doubt that when the 2004 Scholar-Athlete Breakfast rolled around this morning at the Stan Sheriff Center, that Nishimoto would be one of the leading honorees.

Even among 130 of her peers, those who will be feted today for having lettered while earning a cumulative grade point average of 3.0 or better, Nishimoto has managed to stand out with a 3.63 grade point average over her two years at UH, be the Rainbow Wahine's team scholar-athlete and earn an All-Western Athletic Conference academic selection while carrying 16 units each semester.

On a Rainbow Wahine team that has landed nearly half its roster on the scholar-athlete list, Nishimoto has been a prized original. Away from academics she can seem, as coaches put it, "a happy-go-lucky surfer girl without a care in the world."

Valdez said: "She's so driven, so focused (in academics) that it is kinda funny, because from her personality away from studies you pretty much wouldn't know she took her studies that seriously."

Indeed, there have been some scratch-your-head episodes and Yogi Berra-isms that have prompted teammates to wonder. Legend has it she once followed the player she was guarding off the court to the bench, not realizing her opponent had been taken out of the game.

But when it comes to academics, the sophomore speech major is all business. In the Nagatani Academic Center there is an area nicknamed the "Cone of Silence" where some of the most dedicated of students seek respite from the hubbub. That is where, Nishimoto says, she can often be found.

"She barricades herself in there," Valdez said. "Basically, she is self-disciplined and focused to succeed in all her classes. You never have to worry about her not being on top of her studies."

Even when she's riding the south swell at Concessions.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8044.