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DARRELL MIHO / SPECIAL TO THE STAR-ADVERTISER
UH Rainbow Warrior Aaron Valdes gets past Long Beach State 49er Branford Jones and Gabe Levin during the championship final game at the Big West Tournament Saturday night at the Honda Center.
ANAHEIM, CALIF. >> Hawaii is going back to the NCAA Tournament.
By holding off Long Beach State 64-60 in Saturday night’s Big West tournament championship game, the top-seeded Rainbow Warriors punched their first ticket to the Big Dance since 2002.
Roderick Bobbitt’s free throws with 1.7 seconds left clinched the victory for UH (27-5), which tied its single-season wins record.
Several hundred UH fans were on hand at the Honda Center to celebrate the victory. Many rushed the court to celebrate with first-year coach Eran Ganot and the players.
“The feeling is indescribable,” Ganot said. “I am so happy for these guys.”
Long Beach State (20-14) had the ball coming out of a timeout with 18.2 seconds left. Beach point guard Justin Bibbins was off on a 3-point attempt and the ball carried out of bounds with 1.3 seconds left.
After the officials reviewed the play, they awarded the ball to UH and more time went back on the clock. The ball was knocked back out on the inbounds pass with 1.7 seconds left and LBSU fouled Bobbitt before UH could inbound it.
Aaron Valdes led UH with 14 points on 4-for-7 shooting en route to tournament MVP honors. Forward Stefan Jankovic added 10 points and joined Valdes on the all-tournament team.
“It’s awesome to have all my friends and family to be out there, (and) without the support of my teammates I wouldn’t have been able to do it,” said Valdes, of Whittier, Calif.
Several reserve players made key contributions for UH, especially in the first half when Bobbitt and Jankovic went out with foul trouble. UH led 31-25 at halftime and extended its lead to 12 with 13:44 to play on Sheriff Drammeh’s 3-pointer. Backup center Stefan Jovanovic played key minutes, supplying nine points and six rebounds.
“The bench came in and gave us a lift, and we took the lead,” Ganot said. “If that didn’t happen over the course of the year we wouldn’t be where we are today.”
The Rainbows made it a men’s-women’s sweep — the Rainbow Wahine defeated UC Davis for the Big West title earlier in the day.
UH held LBSU to 37.3 percent shooting and avenged a home-and-home sweep during the regular-season.
“It’s disappointing,” LBSU coach Dan Monson said. “We didn’t play as well as we wanted to. Give them credit, they defended us well. I felt like our guys were so excited for the opportunity to play tonight that it took us 30 minutes to settle down on the offensive end.”
Nice to see UH putting LBSU away even with Janks and Bobbit having off nights. They need to be on to survive the first round but it’s on – the Big Dance!
GOOD JOB BY THE BENCHERS.
No one really stood out individually. However as a team they did well across the board. UH won the field goal% battle, the three point% battle, the turnover battle and perhaps the most important, the rebound battle against The Beach. You win all these battles–you win the war. Go Warriors!
The refs stood out. They were awful.
Faust had 7 fouls. One that they reversed and changed to another player and the last one he got called for charging and then the ref changed the call to blocking and gave him free throws with about 4 minutes left in the game. He later committed his 7th foul AFTER he hit a 3 pointer to tie the game.
Ccchhhee-hhhuuuu! ! ! ! !
Now Dance…
Dance past the first round!!!
3Amigo would say, “You can do it!!!”
What a year this has been for both men and women basketball. Men 27-5 Wahine 21-10.
This is only the second time in UH history that both the men’s and women’s basketball teams made it to the NCAA tournament the same year. The first time was in 1994.
Congrats! Job well done! Go Bows!
Congratulations to the Mens and Womens Basketball teams.
yep make mine a double!
Make mine a double double! Yes!
Awesome team effort, especially when the big 3 had to sit in the 1st half with foul issues. The bench came up big, especially defensively and with big shots. No matter what anyone will post negatively about this team, they can’t take away the win and the spot in the Big Dance. Looking forward to flying to wherever the opening round is to cheer you on personally. Thank you Eran Ganot for bringing winning team basketball back to Hawaii.
Besides being a great coach (e.g., set the Big West record for most wins for a rookie coach), Eran Ganot seems to be a class act. Case in point: During the post game interview, he gave credit to former coaches and players who helped build the UH basketball program to where it is today. I’m hoping this will factor in to UH’s appeal of the NCAA’s decision to ban post season games.
how can the clock go from 1.3 seconds to 1.7 the next play?
daylight savings time keeping
Hana hou Hawaii…. Is this the year for Hawaii Warriors????? Is this the year for football also. Maybe first year Warrior head football coach Nick Rolovich can lead our Warriors back to this year’s Sheraton Hawaii Bowl…been absent for five years all under Norm Chow tenure….
Not that it really matters, but one small correction. Four under Chow; one under McMackin.
Allie!! Where are you?
Alkie and HOSSANA are sitting in their cribs and sulking. They know they don’t have a leg to stand on !
Choking on a Crow dinner!
Who cares, really, who cares.
I was going to post this exact comment lol. Probably crying under a rock somewhere.
Clever of those Long Beach guys to dress up in Cal State Fullerton uniforms.
Congrats to these Bows! I hope Gib Arnold enjoyed it haha Loser! Great coaching, great playing. Funny, remember a few years back when UH went to this conference and a dominant was a given? They lived up to it under current regime. Wahine did awesome as well, clean sweep!! The Wahine have been so consistent under coach, fantastic job!
Nice job Warriors!
Well done Mates !!!!!!!
Isaac who?
Wow…what an awesome season! Congrats the Wahine and the Warriors! Way to make the whole 808 proud!
Just an unbelievable feeling to be there to witness this event. So proud of our men’s and women’s team doing it together and winning championship this season and going to NCAA Tournament. ! Congrats to all and special props to the men who battled and fought off a very tough Ling Beach team. I hope the legislators will be more open to helping our UH athletic program as they bring pride to our state and a feeling that all of us were a part of their success by supporting these student athletes through thick and thin and giving them lessons on persevering to obtain an eventual goal that can be achieved. Go Bows!
THE “EL CHEAPO” LEGISLATORS ARE GOING TO SAY THAT THE U.H. PROGRAMS DON’T NEED FINANCIAL HELP, BCOZ THEY CAN WIN WITHOUT ANY MONETARY SUPPORT.
If you told me 2 days ago that the Bows’ line-up for the final game would feature Drammeh and Filopovich at the same time, I would have said, “You’re joking!” But they are my stars of this game. Between them they accounted for 10 valuable points, but more importantly helped to fill the void left by the absence of Janks & Bobbitt. Valdes had a good first half but the entire team got tentative offensively in the 2nd half. Bobbitt’s missed bombers from outside were giving us fits. LBS was tough inside, garnering a lot of offensive boards. They should also get an Oscar for inventing charging fouls by flopping down. All’s well that ends well, and the Bows & the Wahines are both dancing. Interesting to see their draws. Congrats to all for the best seasons by UH basketball in quite a while! Relax and get strong – the story isn’t pau yet. Go Bows!
Go Bows! Great season for both teams.
Great win coach Ganot and coach Beamon also to your coaching staffs, much respect from the state of Hawaii basketball fans. Thank you!!
….Sorry should be Coach Beeman…
Good job on the win. Not to look too forward here but AD Matlin should start contemplating revising coach Ganot’s contract. Success like this won’t go unnoticed by the big schools.
3 down 3 to go! Sweet Sixteen getting closer! Great win! Atmosphere to be there Priceless! Hawaii fans are truly great travel fans, we outnumbered Long Beach and yelled louder. The players were on cloud nine and even Roderick cracked some smiles after the game. We did it with our 2 Big West first teamers having a somewhat off night and the subs playing outstanding especially Jovonovic, Go Bows! Go Bows! Go Bows!