Rainbow Wahine want to reverse downward trend

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BRUCE ASATO / BASATO@STARADVERTISER.COM
Hawaii's Sydney Haydel is defended by Washington State's Dawnyelle Awa (11) and Tia Presley (5) in the first half of the Washington State vs. University of Hawaii Wahine basketball game at Stan Sheriff Center.

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In the big picture, a taxing road trip knocked Hawaii out of the Big West Conference regular-season title race.

Of immediate concern, the Rainbow Wahine were knocked off their game.

"We’re a little off-kilter right now," senior wing Shawna Kuehu said on the heels of the 11-day California trip, during which UH went 1-3 to fall into a four-way tie for third place.

"And we noticed that, and it’s not impossible to fix. So that’s exactly what we’re working to do — changing this, changing the attitude, changing the focus. Because we did lose it a little."

Lingering flu-like symptoms for Kuehu, unusual spats of foul trouble for forward Kamilah Jackson and a lack of shot-making in key late situations doomed UH (11-10, 5-4 Big West) to lose by a combined seven points in gut-wrenching defeats to Long Beach State, Cal State Northridge and conference leader Cal Poly.

Today’s opponent at home, UC Riverside, would seem to be the remedy to cure what ails the Wahine. The woeful Highlanders (4-18, 0-9) have lost 15 straight, despite possessing the second-highest scorer in the league in Brittany Crain. The guard scored 21 in the teams’ last meeting, a 74-61 Wahine victory in Riverside on Jan. 18.

That was during a four-game winning streak in which UH’s chemistry peaked — to this point, anyway.

"We have to rebound. That’s my biggest concern right now with this group," coach Laura Beeman said. "Can they rebound after going 1-3, and not take Riverside lightly, and still continue to get better?

"We gotta put free throws and big shots together," she continued. "Our kids are getting shots at the end of games, but just not hitting them. If you watched the SLO (Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo) game, when (Poly) needed a basket, they hit a basket."

If the Wahine can take both games this week — Cal State Fullerton is Saturday at 5 p.m. — they could earn some separation from fellow 5-4 teams Long Beach, UC Irvine and UC Davis. Fullerton is right behind at 4-4.

UH’s objective now is to finish third or fourth for a first-round bye in the Big West tournament. Second place would be even better, as it affords a double-bye into the semifinals, but leapfrogging second-place Northridge (7-3) will be difficult with seven games to play; the Matadors own the tiebreaker over UH at the moment.

"We’re just not focused on that right now," said Jackson, who is down to 15.6 points and 9.5 rebounds per game. "We’re about us … and just trying to get back on track so we can be where we want to be at the end of our season."