Posted on: Sunday, February 22, 2004

Women's basketball needs more from UH

By Ferd Lewis
Advertiser Columnist

As the University of Hawai'i-Manoa athletic department looks for a successor to Rainbow Wahine basketball coach Vince Goo, it should also take a good, long look at how it treats the program.

While it will be hard for Goo's successor to improve much on his remarkable 17-year winning percentage (.670), or 100 percent graduation rate, there is ample room to bolster the bottom line, if only the school will make the commitment.

There's no reason that one of UH's most successful programs on the court and in the classroom should also remain one of its biggest losers at the bank.

Even in some of its best years, including 20-win plus seasons, the program has cost $500,000 more than it has brought in. In some years, that figure has soared above $600,000 largely because of minimal gate receipts and poor marketing.

Maybe it will never rival men's basketball or Rainbow Wahine volleyball for fan interest or ticket sales. Perhaps the interest isn't there to break even. But there is no reason Rainbow Wahine basketball needs to remain the often-ignored stepsister that successive administrations have often treated it as, or the money drain it remains.

Try as they might, the mostly volunteer efforts of the booster club and a few sponsors, without whom there would have been hardly any promotion at all, couldn't quite fill the gap.

While UH lavished praise on the titles and graduates Rainbow Wahine basketball has produced, administrators have largely left it to fend for itself when it came to marketing and promotion. And, it has showed at the gate, where even the winningest and most popular of Rainbow Wahine teams have struggled to draw a crowd. In the the late 1990s, with a team that featured popular Nani Cockett and BJ Itoman, the Rainbow Wahine hit their attendance peak, averaging 2,126.

But those years were as rare was they were wonderful. This year, the average has been a mere 627 entering last night. Meanwhile, Fresno State averages 4,602.

It is going to take more than the new head coach to change that. It is also going to require more of a commitment from the administration from the start.

Now that UH has brought marketing back in-house and beefed up its staff, there should be no excuse for failing to turn some attention and expertise the Rainbow Wahine's way.

Years ago, it was left to Goo's boosters to start a junior Rainbow Wahine program for girls. "We promised them free tickets and T-shirts," Goo recalled. "We thought maybe 80 or 90 would show up that first year. But we had 400. Later, it got up to 1,200."

Said Goo: "I think I'm still paying for those T-shirts."

Meanwhile, you wonder how long UH will have to pay the price for not putting forth a better effort to market its women's basketball team.

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