The University of Hawai'i women's basketball team took care of the ball up high and down low to beat Idaho, 68-53, in a Western Athletic Conference game last night.

Rainbow Wahine senior forward Tanya Smith grabbed 25 rebounds, one shy of the school record, at the Stan Sheriff Center in front of 385 fans.

Renee McKnight holds the school record of 26 rebounds set in 1978 against Utah State.

"Kinda from my own shots so it's not really that impressive," Smith said laughing. "I just need to make my shots. It's probably better to have less rebounds and more points, but we won so it doesn't really matter."

Smith finished 6 of 18 from the field and scored 14 points. She also had five assists, four steals and a block for Hawai'i, which never trailed.

"That's Tanya. She comes and she has her lunch bucket and hard hat and she just comes and goes to work every game we play," Hawai'i coach Jim Bolla said.

The Rainbow Wahine (8-11, 2-4 WAC) also matched a season-low in turnovers with 18, a statistic that has plagued them all season (they average almost 24 per game).

"For us to have less than 20 turnovers, that's a big deal," Bolla said.

After a slow start, the Rainbow Wahine broke an 8-all tie with a 19-7 run led by three Megan Tinnin 3-pointers to make it 27-15 with 9:27 left in the half.

Hawai'i matched its largest lead of 15 points three times in the first half, with the last coming on Saundra Cariaga's jumper with 41 seconds left to make it 36-21.

But the Rainbow Wahine squandered their 36-23 halftime lead, allowing Idaho back in it with a 16-3 run midway through the second half. A basket by Alana Curtis with 6:41 left helped the Vandals close to 48-47.

"They came out in the second half a little bit stronger than we did," Smith said. "We thought the game was done and we thought we were going to make everything. We didn't work as hard as we should have straight off."

Hawai'i answered with 12 straight points to make it 60-47 with 3:19 left. Smith, a 6-foot-3 senior forward, capped the run with a field goal.

"I think we just knew what we had to do to get up front," Smith said. "We just gave up for a second and then we just got straight back in and went to work."

Bolla was disappointed his team had several Vandals (2-17, 1-6) in foul trouble and couldn't capitalize.

"If we can get (Katie) Madison and Curtis out early, it's a whole different game," he added.

Madison had nine points and Curtis 10 with both picking up their fourth fouls early in the second half. Carli Bakondy scored 11 points.

Hawai'i's Iwona Zagrobelna had 15 points and Tinnin had all 12 of her points in the first half.

Hawai'i will next play road games against New Mexico State on Thursday and Louisiana Tech on Saturday.

Reach Leila Wai at lwai@honoluluadvertiser.com.