‘Bows bump Bulldogs

There was no other way to put it: Zane Johnson was having an awful offensive game against Fresno State.

Yet it was the Hawaii senior captain who had the ball at the top of the key on the decisive play of the game. Johnson dribbled out the clock, waving off teammates who started to run an offensive set. UH’s top scorer drove left and had it stripped by the Bulldogs’ Kevin Olekaibe, but recovered and drained a 15-foot elbow jumper for a six-point lead with 34.1 seconds left.

The Rainbow Warriors held on against their sometimes-rival for a 62-58 win on Saturday night at the Stan Sheriff Center, thanks to that play and center Vander Joaquim, who submitted 23 points on 10-for-14 shooting to go with 12 rebounds and two blocks.

"I just feel like this is my team, so I want to put them on my back as much as I can," said Johnson, who finished with four points on 2-for-8 shooting and five turnovers. "Trying to do other things to help us win. Anything I can do, I will. I just felt like I can make that shot. I’ve done it hundreds of times by myself …. it was the best opportunity at the time."

He also applied effective face-to-face defense on the Western Athletic Conference’s top scorer, Olekaibe, who was held 10 points below his 18.2 average.

A vocal crowd of about 6,500 was on hand for the teams’ last WAC meeting in Honolulu before they go their separate ways — UH to the Big West Conference and Fresno State to the Mountain West. They were rewarded when the fourth-place ‘Bows (14-10, 6-4 WAC) bounced back from a loss to WAC leader Nevada on Thursday and solidified their position among the league’s top half. UH is tied with third-place Idaho in the loss column and two ahead of fifth-place Utah State with four WAC games to play.

But now the ‘Bows break from the WAC to host New Orleans on Tuesday and travel to Montana on Saturday in a BracketBusters matchup. The team will take today off to rest following the hard-fought win.

"I loved how my team bounced back tonight," UH coach Gib Arnold said. "I thought after that tough one on Thursday that they showed a lot of pride in who we are, and played what I thought was a stellar game. Intensity was there all game. … I thought on the offensive end we were patient, we shared the ball, didn’t turn it over. Kept grinding."

A grind, indeed. Athletic Fresno — smaller, but quicker — had no turnovers in the second half, and made a spirited run to chop UH’s nine-point lead to two at 58-56. But the Bulldogs (11-16, 3-8) missed their next six shots and Joston Thomas (11 points) hit two free throws with 3 minutes left for a four-point lead.

Then UH was on Zane Time when neither team could score on the other over the next several possessions.

"Give Zane johnson a lot of credit," Arnold said. "He affected winning. Sometimes you don’t do it by hitting shots … (That was a) big shot. Big shot by a very, very good player. He had two points up till then, hadn’t hit a shot in a long time . . . that’s as big a shot as he has had."

Tyler Johnson soared for a putback, but Olekaibe and point guard Steven Shepp missed 3-pointers in the final 30 seconds.

First-year FSU coach Rodney Terry was left to rue the final few minutes and 38.6 percent shooting by his team, to 51 percent for UH.

"There were a couple broken plays there they capitalized on," Terry said. "They made a couple of tough shots, a couple key free throws down the stretch and they did what they had to do to protect home court."

UH improved to 3-2 at home in the WAC against the seven-man rotation of the shorter Bulldogs, whom the ‘Bows outrebounded 35-29 — a key stat after UH was outrebounded by 19 against Nevada.

The Bulldogs erased a four-point halftime deficit and took the lead early in the second half, but UH responded with a 10-0 run on the play of Joaquim and Trevor Wiseman, the latter of whom played 19 key minutes off the bench in his return from a team suspension.

A season highlight happened at the midpoint of the second half. Point guard Miah Ostrowski (seven assists, one turnover) drove into the teeth of the Fresno State defense with the shot clock running down. He flipped a nifty behind-the-back pass in traffic to Joaquim, and the big man flushed it with one hand on the Bulldogs.

"I didn’t expect that pass," a grinning Joaquim said. "I look at the clock, 2 seconds, 1 second. That was a good pass by Miah, so I just finished the play."

FSU went nearly the first 7 minutes of the game without a field goal. UH took advantage with a 9-0 lead.

The Bulldogs countered with a 13-4 run and Olekaibe hit a 3 to make it 18-17, then Kevin Foster tied it up at 24 on a putback.

UH scored the final two baskets of the half, including a Joaquim thunder dunk from Ostrowski for a 28-24 lead.

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