Quarterback Taylor Graham ended the University of Hawaii’s football season opener the same way he started it, flat on his back on the Aloha Stadium turf looking up.

He got sacked for a 5-yard loss on the game’s first play and threw a 60-yard touchdown pass to Keith Kirkwood on his final one 3 hours, 33 minutes later.

In between he got a 72-play black-and-blue initiation to being a starter in college football in a 30-13 loss to 24th-ranked USC.

For much of of his much-anticipated UH debut, Graham looked a lot like what he was, somebody who hadn’t thrown a pass in three years of college football. Somebody who hadn’t authored a touchdown pass in almost four years, dating to the third game of his injury-abbreviated senior high school season at Wheaton North (Illinois).

It had been so long, in fact, that Graham struggled to recall the last TD off a broken play against West Chicago High.

Or, maybe it was just the pounding of seven sacks.

Either way, the accumulated rust of a redshirt year at Ohio State, a year on the Buckeyes’ bench and another redshirt season at UH showed in four interceptions in a 16-for-41, 208-yard passing night.

He overthrew receivers and underthrew some. There was confusion on some routes and breakdowns in blocking and reads. And there was a lot of head shaking.

For a while it looked like Graham’s biggest offensive contribution was going to be the decleating block he threw during Bubba Poueu-Luna’s 19-yard reverse.

School started at the Manoa campus Monday, but for Graham, despite a spring and fall camp, it began in earnest Thursday night on national television.

"I wasn’t as accurate as I could have been," Graham said. "But I don’t buy the (layoff) as an excuse. I’ve just got to get better at honing in on things. You can’t do those things against a team like USC."

And it showed, with interceptions helping the Trojans to 17 of their first 20 points.

"Give him time," coach Norm Chow maintained. "When he came off the field he knew when he had made the wrong reads. He knew when he had thrown a couple of bad balls into coverage. But he will learn. He is learning."

Chow said, "You can see the talent. You can see the ability, I think. I could anyway. He threw some good balls, too."

Graham will tell you that too many of them came too late in a game the Rainbow Warriors could have made much more of a contest out of had they only been able to follow the example set by the stout defense.

"We didn’t get it clicking on offense (in time)," Graham sighed.

Finally, on his 41st pass, a loft to Kirkwood, the ‘Bows found the end zone with 30 seconds left, as Graham was taken down by a defender.

"I got hit there at the end, but I was able to see (the touchdown) on the video monitor," Graham said. "I had a clear vision through some linemen to see it. It was good to see some success there at the end."

Finally, from a familiar place on the turf, he could say things were looking up.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.