The University of Hawaii baseball and softball teams had their pairs of aces cracked this week. It remains to be seen if it will cost them in their hopes for long postseason runs.

All season, up until the past few days, UH could depend on its elite pitchers … two on each squad; Matt Sisto and Jarrett Arakawa for the Rainbows, and Stephanie Ricketts and Kaia Parnaby for the Wahine. If one faltered (which was rare), the other picked things up.

Both teams were flying high, as baseball had swept New Mexico State to climb into first place in the WAC and the 11th-/13th-ranked Wahine finished as regular-season conference champs upon a sweep at Utah State. A repeat of — or even improvement on — what happened two years ago when baseball went to the NCAA regionals and softball to the College World Series seemed quite possible, maybe even likely.

But both have pulled a U-turn at an inopportune time; the Rainbows hope to avoid being swept at Sacramento State today, and the Wahine were knocked out of the double-elimination WAC tournament with losses to BYU and Fresno State on Friday.

Coach Mike Trapasso’s baseball team was closing in on the WAC regular-season championship — or at least one of the two top spots, guaranteeing a valuable first-round bye in the conference tournament that determines the WAC’s guaranteed NCAA tournament representative.

Now it’s a mad dash to the finish, with Sacramento State, UH and New Mexico State all within 11⁄2 games of first-place Nevada heading into today’s games.

For softball, the stumble could be very costly; UH’s bid to host an NCAA regional is dead and Hawaii won’t get to play at home, where it went 26-3 this year, including a win against then-No. 1 California.

Also, those who have seen bad things repeatedly happen to UH’s women’s basketball and volleyball teams when the NCAA selects its tournament fields would not be surprised if the Wahine are left out of the NCAAs altogether — despite their 44-7 record that includes some quality wins.

That would be a travesty, but the committee could try to justify such a move with a what-have-you-done-lately stance.

For the Wahine, that would be the frittering of 3-0 and 6-0 leads against BYU and Fresno State, on the same day, as Parnaby and Ricketts — both with ERAs close to Bluto Blutarsky’s GPA of 0.00 — suffered rare poor outings.

The Rainbows are far from done, but they must bounce back quickly. Yesterday’s defeat signaled the first time UH lost the first two games of a series in WAC play this season, and only the second time against all opponents. There was no reason to expect Sisto and Arakawa to combine to allow 10 runs in 10 innings.

For both teams, you can’t blame just the pitchers, of course. Defensive miscues and lack of consistent hitting betrayed the Wahine and Rainbows this week, too. And playing away from home didn’t help.

Assuming the Wahine do get into the NCAA tournament, their two ace pitchers must return to form — there’s no other option, since they’ve pitched every inning this season.

Here’s a potential problem when aces falter: It can attack the psyche of the rest of your staff. But the Rainbows’ third starter, freshman Scott Squier, is heavy on poise and he gets a chance to turn his team back around today. UH’s staff is deep, and Trapasso did a good job of not burning up his quality bullpen arms in the two losses. Squier and three relievers combined to beat New Mexico State 1-0 a week ago.

Whatever happens today in Sacramento, the regular-season-ending series against Nevada at Les Murakami Stadium starting Thursday looms large, and the Rainbows need their aces back to being aces.

Reach Dave Reardon at dreardon@staradvertiser.com or 529-4783