UH happy with title but eyes bigger prize

It was a swim-weights-shoot triathlon of a workout Saturday morning for the Hawaii Rainbow Wahine basketball team. And it was done with a new title: Big West champion.

Hawaii (20-7, 12-2 Big West) clinched its first outright title since 1993-94 at Long Beach State on Thursday, a 47-46 closer-than-needed-be victory that was the Wahine’s 12th in a row.

The celebration was done in the locker room at the Walter Pyramid, spraying sparkling cider in the shower and washing off the accompanying stickiness.

What Hawaii wants to do before heading back out on the road Tuesday is to make sure some of the residue from the game with the 49ers has been washed away as well. The way the Rainbow Wahine had to hold on following their 24th turnover on a shot-clock violation in the final seconds is very much a wake-up call.

"Winning the conference is huge, but it’s only one of our goals," Hawaii coach Laura Beeman said. "We have to figure out why we’re not playing well.

"We don’t want to lose to Santa Barbara (on the road on Thursday) or Fullerton (at home on Saturday) because it will affect our seeding, whether it is the WNIT or especially the NCAAs. We need to refocus."

Hawaii has already clinched a postseason tournament spot, but whether it’s the Big West’s automatic berth into the WNIT for the third straight year or the NCAA for the first time since 1998 depends on the outcome of the Big West tournament.

The Rainbow Wahine have earned a double-bye into the semifinals on March 12 at the Honda Center in Anaheim, Calif.

"It doesn’t matter if we’re conference champions now," senior guard Shawna-Lei Kuehu said. "Losing in the (Big West) tournament is the last thing we want.

"We need to get back to playing Hawaii basketball. We didn’t showcase that at Long Beach. It’s been really good that we’ve been to the WNIT the last two years, but we really want the NCAAs."

Hawaii concludes the regular season against two of the bottom three teams: at last-place UC Santa Barbara on Thursday and at the Stan Sheriff Center on Saturday with seventh-place Cal State Fullerton. Saturday will be senior night for Kuehu, Ashleigh Karaitiana Shawlina Segovia and Morgan Mason.

Mason has been sidelined since going down with a foot injury against UC Irvine on Feb. 19. Beeman said the earliest Mason would be back playing is Saturday.

Beeman also said her contract paperwork has finally cleared, extending her contract through 2016-17.

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CORRECTION: A previous version of this story reported that Hawaii last made an NCAA appearance in 1993.