A standing-room-only crowd of Warrior faithful leaped to their feet last night and stomped on the floor of East Side Bar & Grill, celebrating Hawai'i's 39-27 victory over Boise State in beer- and pupu-fueled style.

Lesley Masumoto of Pacific Heights spent most of the night cheering, "Let's go, 'Bows! Let's go, 'Bows!" over pitchers of beer and said in victory, "This is the most fantastic game we have ever played. We deserve to have a BCS bowl game. It's been a hard road. But we believed and we have achieved."

Similar scenes played out in clubs, bars, living rooms and carports across the Islands yesterday. But at East Side Grill, one-time strangers high-fived with each successful UH drive and bought each other shots of hard liquor to rejoice.

After UH's 11th consecutive victory of the season, East Side's karaoke system blared with "Celebration" by Kool and the Gang, followed by "We Are The Champions" by Queen.

Throughout the game, Nicky Chapin, a counselor at Kahala Elementary School, manned the microphone, encouraging the crowd with chants of "Let's go, 'Bows! Let's go, 'Bows" and "Dee-fense! Dee-fense!"

But the crowd needed little help in cheering every pass completion and first down and booing close calls they disputed.

Worried about UH quarterback Colt Brennan's recovery from a concussion suffered two weeks ago, nearly the entire crowd shouted "Slide, slide, slide!" whenever Brennan carried the ball.

At one point during a break in the game, the fans at East Side Grill even yelled wildly for a beef jerky commercial in which Bigfoot clotheslines a hiker who annoyed the beast with the reflection from his watch.

Jared Perreira actually had four tickets to the game courtesy of his close friends and Saint Louis School classmates, Timo Paepule and Jason Rivers, who are stars on this year's UH football team.

But Perreira, 22, of Mililani, chose to give his tickets to his family. Instead, he and his school buddy, T.J. Meyer, 21, of Kailua, set themselves up in front of a TV at East Side over sizzling steaks, rice, soy beans and individual pitchers of a drink called Fish Bowl.

"It's just a bunch of alcohol all mixed together," Perreira said, stirring his own pitcher.

His girlfriend called his cell phone during the game to ask if he would go shopping on the day after Thanksgiving, which is known as "Black Friday."

Perreira, ordering his second pitcher of Fish Bowl, would have none of it.

His friend Meyer said, "Black Friday and all that game traffic — this is the place to be."

Dean Santo, Mililani High School's varsity baseball coach, chose to pull into East Side Grill almost two hours before the game and got a prime table directly in front of three of the restaurant/bar's 27 television sets. Santo had just finished conducting mental training for his players in Kahala and "instead of fighting traffic to get back home to 'Aiea, this is the place to camp out," he said.

He brought along sports psychologist Brian Cain of Vermont, who initially was going to root for Boise State.

"But since I've been on the island these last three days and seen the passion for this team, I've been swayed to see UH win," Cain said.

Ali Kaohi, who works in craft services for the TV show "Lost," sat at a table with his son Mana, 12, and daughter Emma, 8. "I've been watching UH here all the time," Kaohi said. "I didn't want to jinx the streak."

Most of the 200 people watching the game were like Dr. Dave Kurahara, an associate professor of pediatrics at the UH Medical School.

"Let's see," he said, "we ordered hamburger steak, soy beans, sizzling steak and lots of beer."

Some people in the crowd bet on the game and flip-flopped their loyalties depending on which team was likely to beat the point spread.

But Angela Tokuda, a UH law student, refused to give up on the Warriors early on while the score was still close.

With UH ahead 19-17, Tokuda called it "probably the best game of the year. It's definitely living up to the hype."

As the game wound down with UH leading 32-27, the Warriors missed a two-point conversion — on top of two earlier blocked point-after kicks.

From University Avenue, the crowd tried to change the momentum of the game miles away at Aloha Stadium, willing the action on the television sets by screaming, "Let's Go, Warriors! Let's Go, Warriors!"

Receiver C.J. Hawthorne then caught a 30-yard touchdown pass from Brennan to make the score 38-27, sealing the win.

Masumoto and nearly everyone else jumped from their seats.

"We deserve this," Masumoto said. "We really deserve this."

Reach Dan Nakaso at dnakaso@honoluluadvertiser.com.