All season, the Hawaii men’s basketball team has tried to smash a lingering turnover bug.
Against UC Irvine on Wednesday, the bug did in the Rainbow Warriors.
Hawaii was victimized by giveaways — 16 in all, several of them late in the game, to 11 for the Anteaters — in its first Big West road game of the season. The 68-64 loss temporarily knocked the Rainbows from the top of the league standings.
Cal Poly lost 69-67 to UC Davis on Thursday, creating a three-way tie for first among the Mustangs, Rainbows and 49ers.
The ‘Bows were outscored 21-9 in points off turnovers, a stat that has rarely gone UH’s way this season. UH (9-6, 3-1 BWC) slid into a tie with its opponent on Saturday, defending champion Long Beach State (7-8, 3-1).
A back-and-forth game got away in the last minutes on Wednesday. UH had five turnovers between 6:27 and 3:15 remaining, during which the Anteaters built their lead for good.
"You obviously look at the last couple turnovers there with a few minutes left. Those stand out the most," coach Gib Arnold said in a phone interview.
"I thought the guys played really hard and did a nice job. But I did think we turned the ball over too much … throughout the game. We really need to continue to work on that. Get better at not turning the ball over. And we need to turn it over (on opponents). Our defensive percentages are good. Our rebounding is outstanding. We need to try to cause some more turnovers."
UH is having the ball stolen 8.1 times per game, while making only 4.7 swipes from opponents. The overall turnover average is 16.1 by UH to 11.3 by foes. That’s a margin of negative 4.8, last in the Big West.
Ball control was a focal point of Thursday’s practice.
"It was one of the most competitive practices we had all year, which is a very good thing because it’s a sign that our team is bothered by losing," said junior forward Christian Standhardinger, who had a career-high 13 rebounds as part of his team-high sixth double-double of the season.
"I think we made a lot of steps forward."
UH had a chance at the Bren Events Center. Down nine in the final minute. Center Vander Joaquim made a jumper, followed by a steal and a tough, falling-out-of-bounds corner 3 from Brandon Jawato, cutting the deficit to four with 30 seconds left.
Garrett Jefferson stole the ball on the next inbounds play and Jawato had an open look to get it to one, but the ball wouldn’t go down.
"I had a good look, and it rimmed in and out," said Jawato, an El Segundo native who had about 40 family and friends present. "It was just tough on the road, a tough loss.
"We had a lot of turnovers in the last five minutes of the game. That basically was when the game was decided."
Joaquim scored 15 points on 7-for-9 shooting, giving him 978 points in his three-year UH career. He needs 22 points to become the program’s 15th 1,000-point scorer. He passed Michael Kuebler (977) for 15th on the scoring list.
