Back surgery will sideline Dressler

Another year will pass Caleb Dressler by.

The Hawaii basketball freshman center will have back surgery and miss the entire 2013-14 season, coming off a 2012-13 campaign in which he sat out games as a redshirt.

UH hoped rest would cure what ailed Dressler after he suffered a bulging disc in his back while taking contact going up for a rebound on the first day of practice. He’s sat out practices and scrimmages for three weeks since, but recent tests revealed surgery is necessary and he faces a five- to six-month recovery time.

Dressler said he’d have the surgery likely within a week.

"I’d rather do it now than have to worry about it even next year or something like that down the road," Dressler said. "It was just nagging, it wasn’t getting better. It was getting worse. I was hoping (to play through it), but after a certain point in time, the last couple weeks, I’ve just been like, ‘it’s just a matter of time (for surgery) now.’ My back isn’t doing what I thought it’d be doing."

In addition to the disc problem, Dressler said he had two stress fractures in his lower back from his days at Evergreen (Wash.) High.

UH coach Gib Arnold said Dressler has a strong chance at qualifying for a medical hardship to get a year of eligibility back.

"Big loss. I thought he did a great job last year of getting himself ready to play," Arnold said. "He was going to play an integral role this year in our rotation. But injuries are part of the game. It’s unfortunate. … You don’t like that, but it is what it is."

The 6-foot-10, 245-pound Dressler was expected to contend for frontcourt minutes off the bench this season. With Dressler out, 6-foot-10 freshman Stefan Jovanovic becomes, by default, the team’s fourth big man behind Christian Standhardinger, Isaac Fotu and Davis Rozitis.

"I think the older guys — Davis, Christian and myself with experience, and now Stefan — have to all step up," said Fotu, a sophomore forward. "But I think it will be good for us. We all get a lot of reps in practice with Caleb out, so we’ll be ready when the time comes. … Every minute we’re on the court we’ll give 100 percent. Whenever Coach sees we’re not going 100 percent he’ll probably take us off. We’ll just keep rotating all our bigs. I think we’ll be fine."

Mike Thomas, a 6-foot-8, 215-pound freshman, has played at power forward in recent practices to bolster the frontcourt.

"I think we’re going to keep him there (this season)," Arnold said of Thomas. "We’re wanting to eventually develop him into a small forward."

Freshman point guard Niko Filipovich, who suffered a dislocated left shoulder two weeks ago, returned to practice on Friday.