Rainbow Wahine throttle Anteaters

Ashleigh Karaitiana found a remedy for a rough start shooting the ball.

Keep shooting.

The Hawaii senior missed her first seven shots Saturday night as part of a cold collective opening quarter for the Rainbow Wahine basketball team in its Big West matchup with UC Irvine.

The Wahine managed just eight points out of the game’s first 13 minutes before Karaitiana’s eighth attempt, a 3-pointer in front of the UCI bench, zipped through the net and effectively ripped the lid off the basket for UH.

The Wahine pulled away from there and completed a sweep of their homestand with a 59-35 win in the first game of Saturday’s UH basketball doubleheader at the Stan Sheriff Center.

“Although I was missing shots before that I was still confident in making shots,” Karaitiana said. “They all felt really good to me. … But I give credit to (assistant) coach Alex (Delanian) for continuously being on my back and telling me to keep holding my follow-through, keep shooting because it’s eventually going to fall and it did.”

All 11 UH players who suited up scored and the Wahine (12-9, 5-3 BWC) limited UCI to single-digit scoring in the first three quarters in the program’s stingiest defensive performance since holding LIU Brooklyn to 33 on Dec. 28, 2012.

UH took a 26-17 lead into halftime, then outscored the Anteaters 23-6 in the third quarter to all but secure its second win over UCI (4-18, 1-7) in nine days.

“That’s really exciting for us. I don’t think we even noticed we were doing it,” UH center Megan Huff said of setting a season low for points allowed. “It was just boxing out and getting boards and making sure they don’t get offensive rebounds.”

Huff led all scorers with 15 points and blocked three shots in her first start of the season. The 6-foot-3 sophomore had been averaging nine points per game off the bench and moved into the starting lineup in place of senior center Kalei Adolpho, who didn’t suit up after taking an elbow in the face in Thursday’s win over Cal State Fullerton.

“Huff’s a very capable starter, we know that,” UH coach Laura Beeman said. “There’s no reason she doesn’t start other than rotations for us.”

Senior Destiny King finished with eight points and nine rebounds and Karaitiana scored seven points, all of them coming in an 11-2 second-quarter run that pushed the Wahine ahead. Guards Olivia Crawford and Marissa Wimbley also contributed seven points each.

UH ended up shooting 31 percent from the field but went 21-for-25 from the free-throw line.

“Very pleased. Very different than Thursday night, thank goodness,” Beeman said, referencing UH’s ragged 62-53 win over Cal State Fullerton two nights earlier.

“We’re still not shooting the ball as crisp as we need to and some of the decision-making is not as good as it needs to be, but overall execution was better, hit shots, better energy on the floor and that’s going to bode well for us.”

Mokun Fajemisin led UCI with 11 points on a tough shooting night on all levels for the Anteaters, who shot 28 percent from the field and went 8-for-17 from the line.

The win pushed UH into fourth place in the Big West heading into a road trip to face two teams just behind in Cal Poly (10-10, 3-4) on Thursday and UC Santa Barbara (7-14, 4-3) on Saturday. The top four teams at the end of the regular season receive a bye in the first round of the Big West tournament.

BIG WEST WOMEN

Saturday

Hawaii 59, UC Irvine 35

UC Davis 80, UC Santa Barbara 51

CSUN 79, Cal State Fullerton 52

Long Beach State 65, Cal Poly 53

Wednesday

Cal State Fullerton at UC Santa Barbara

Thursday

Hawaii at Cal Poly, 5 p.m. HST

UC Davis at UC Riverside

CSUN at Long Beach State

HAWAII 59, UC IRVINE 35

Key — fg-a: field goals made-attempted; ft-a: free throws made-attempted; r: rebounds; pf: personal fouls; pts: total points; a: assists; to: turnovers; min: minutes played.

Halftime — Hawaii 26, UC Irvine 17

3-points goals — UC Irvine 1-5 (Chavez 1-2, Piper 0-1, Ritter 0-2). Hawaii 4-18 (Wimbley 2-3, Karaitiana 1-4, Toeaina 1-5, Harris 0-1, Salanoa 0-1, Crawford 0-4). Steals — UC Irvine 5 (Cheung-Sutton 2, Kellum, Piper , Ritter). Hawaii 6 (Wimbley 3, Crawford 2, Huff). Blocked shots — UC Irvine 7 (Ritter 3, Fajemisin 2, Sutherland 2).

Hawaii 3 (Huff 3). Turnovers — UC Irvine 25 (Jackson 5, Cheung-Sutton 4, Fajemisin 3, Chavez 2 Kellum 2, Piper 2, Sutherland 2, Ritter, Hicks, Knox, Santana, TEAM). Hawaii 14 (Huff 5, Morris 3, Harris 2, Salanoa 2, Toeaina 2). Technical fouls — none. Officials — Janetta Graham, Deon Lewis, Patrick Black-Santiago. A—NA.