IRVINE, Calif. » Even after 18 hours, deja vu struck Hawaii’s baseball team Saturday.

The Rainbow Warriors collected another unearned run and three more hits in their second consecutive 4-1 loss to UC Irvine at Anteater Ballpark.

So after two games of its first Big West Conference road trip, UH’s batting order produced two unearned runs and six hits — and has yet to see the Anteaters’ best pitcher.

Irvine’s Andrew Morales will face UH ace Matt Cooper today. Morales began the week tied for the conference lead in victories (6) and is seventh in earned-run average (2.15) and 10th in opponents’ batting average (.248).

Cooper, meanwhile, ranks fifth in both ERA (2.13) and opposition batting average (.212), and shares fourth place in strikeouts (41).

"We’ve faced great pitching all year," UH coach Mike Trapasso said. "Nobody’s faced the pitching we have this year because we’ve played the No. 1 schedule in the country."

Add the Anteaters’ Matt Whitehouse to that list. The junior left-hander amassed nine strikeouts and 11 groundouts in 72⁄3 innings while conceding only two hits, two walks and the unearned run.

Pi‘ikea Kitamura — who got two of the Rainbows’ hits and drove in their only run — compared Whitehouse to Irvine’s Andrew Thurman, Friday night’s winning pitcher.

"They’re real similar," Kitamura said. "They mixed up their pitches and they had good command of two or three pitches. As a hitter, it’s hard enough to cover one pitch. When you’ve got to cover two, it makes it more difficult."

Trapasso expressed a different opinion.

"I thought that Whitehouse, frankly, was better than Thurman," he said. "From the get-go, we just really struggled with him. He was throwing a good, hard, power slider and he was throwing it a lot. We just really struggled with it."

Whitehouse’s performance overshadowed one of Corey MacDonald’s better outings of the year. MacDonald permitted an unearned run, a walk and three hits in the first five innings while inducing seven groundouts.

"He pitched well the whole game," Trapasso said. "He battled and deserved a better fate. I feel for him."

Irvine (19-8, 2-3), ranked 27th nationally, scored an unearned run in the bottom of the third inning. But UH (7-20, 2-3) twice put the potential tying run at second base in the next two innings.

Kitamura walked to start the fourth and moved to second base on Kaeo Aliviado’s sacrifice. But Whitehouse struck out Marc Flores and Conner George to end that threat.

Next inning, same script, only Trevor Podratz drew the leadoff walk and Jerry Kleman executed the sacrifice. Then L.J. Brewster grounded out and Austin Wobrock struck out.

Irvine extended the lead to 2-0 in the sixth before using Dominique Taylor’s two-run home run in the seventh to build a 4-0 lead. Before that blast, Chris Rabago kept the inning going with a soft line drive into right field with two out.

"We should have been out of that inning," Trapasso said. "We had Rabago struck out and we don’t get the call."

The ‘Bows broke the shutout in the eighth. Brewster reached base on a throwing error, advanced two bases on two separate groundouts and scored on Kitamura’s single.

Irvine used its third successive win to extend Hawaii’s losing streak to three games.