The Hawaii men’s basketball team played right into Pepperdine’s hands on Saturday.

On Tuesday, the Rainbow Warriors went back to playing their own game.

UH held a closed practice for its first full session since the disappointing 63-56 home loss to the Waves of the West Coast Conference. UH (4-3) put up a season low in points, taking its second straight defeat and second setback of the season at the Stan Sheriff Center.

“I felt (before Saturday) that this team overall has improved in every game and has gotten better in every practice. That was the first time where I think we took a little bit of a step back,” coach Gib Arnold said. “The No. 1 thing is we didn’t get out and run. It’s been very good to us, and our transition game was really slow.”

Preparation for Saturday’s game against Chaminade (3-5) on Molokai gets a little more complicated because it’s finals week for the fall semester. Arnold gave the team Monday off to study for exams.

Outlet passes were a definite emphasis in UH’s preferred rebound-and-run game on Tuesday.

“The wings gotta get out and run more,” said junior guard Brandon Spearman, who was held scoreless for the first time as a Rainbow. “We’ve gotta get down and give the bigs the opportunity to (throw) outlet passes. Pretty much delivering it from the wings and everybody being in their spots. Get back to what we was doing the first four or five games.”

The Pepperdine game yielded some unsettling numbers: UH shot a season-low 33.3 percent (18-for-54) from the field and a woeful 50 percent (13-for-26) from the free-throw line.

Eleven of the 13 free-throw misses came in the second half, a killer after the ’Bows had rallied from their halftime hole to tie the game at 38.

It all added up to the worst overall outing of the still-young season by far. UH again got next to no production from the wings, as point guard Jace Tavita and big men Vander Joaquim and Christian Standhardinger accounted for five of UH’s seven 3-pointers. Small forward Hauns Brereton was held in single-digit scoring for the third straight game.

“We just didn’t play with no toughness. Like the coaches said, we got out-toughed,” Spearman said. “That shouldn’t ever happen at home, and it’s never going to happen again, I believe.”

UH was unable to dominate the paint on either end, and a wash in the rebounding game made it difficult for the Rainbows to fire the ball into the open court. The Waves, meanwhile, succeeded in being patient, then converting late in the shot clock. They picked their spots effectively to speed things up, especially in the early going when they built an eight-point halftime lead.

“We fast-broke half as many times as our second-slowest game,” said Arnold, who credited Pepperdine for dictating its glacial game plan. “You could see we weren’t really ourselves.”

Arnold met individually with almost every player on the team for 10 to 15 minutes to better define their roles.

“We want to make sure everybody plays to their strengths,” Arnold said. “It was a tough game, not the end of the world.”