ANAHEIM, Calif. » Hawaii coach Laura Beeman held it together for most of her team’s postgame press conference in the back chambers of the Honda Center.

Her eyes welled up, though, as she prepared to speak about her team’s resolve in the face of an emotionally crushing defeat. UH’s 15-game winning streak was snapped in a 67-60 loss to Cal State Northridge in the championship game of the Big West tournament on Saturday, likely preventing the Rainbow Wahine from making their first NCAA tournament appearance since 1998.

"My turn," Beeman said to the red-faced players sitting next to her, Shawna-Lei Kuehu and Megan Huff.

"This team is a fighting team," the third-year coach said after taking a moment to regain her composure. "They want to play as many games together as they possibly can, so we will win as many games in a row as we can to continue that."

UH (23-8) has an automatic berth to the WNIT thanks to the regular-season championship it earned in such convincing fashion. It will find out its draw in the 64-team field on Monday, including whether it can host a first-round game.

It was tough consolation to take, however, for a team with its sights set much higher.

"Honestly, this one hurts," Kuehu said. "We’ve accomplished so much this year, this season, that of course it’s going to take some time to let the wounds heal. But … it’s not over. We still have another tournament to compete for. We’re a good team. We’re going to come back and we’re going to make the changes. We’re hungry, you know? We always want to get better. We’ll take this as a learning experience and move on."

Kuehu shot 2-for-13 in the championship for seven points, but grabbed eight rebounds and blocked four shots. She was named to the all-tournament team along with Destiny King (13 points, eight rebounds). Huff had a career night of 16 points and 14 rebounds, 10 of them offensive. But she was the only consistently effective UH player.

CSUN (23-9) felt like it was a different team since UH routed the Matadors 64-49 in Honolulu on Jan. 31. A month and a half elapsed since then, and coach Jason Flowers’ team — once 4-5 in league play — rallied to win its last seven regular-season games, then two more in two days at the Honda.

The Matadors were undeterred by UH’s height advantage at almost every position and kept on coming even when the Wahine spiked a half dozen of their shots into the seats in the first half. UH blocked a season-high 11 shots.

That was part of what CSUN’s diminutive guards face every day in practice, and they were thus unfazed, Flowers said. Kuehu rejected guard Janae Sharpe three times emphatically in the first half alone.

CSUN got 22 points from tournament MVP Ashlee Guay and Sharpe scored 20 anyway in punching their team’s return ticket to the NCAA tournament.

UH, meanwhile, has gotten to progressively further conference tournament rounds in each of Beeman’s three seasons — the second round in 2013, the semifinals in 2014 and now the title game, which was UH’s first such appearance since 2002. But the end result was the same — disappointment.

"Obviously Hawaii had a tremendous regular season and they deserved to be the regular-season champion, which to be quite honest is harder to do," Flowers said. "The 16-game schedule that you have to be consistent over … Laura’s done a great job building that program, and so we have a lot of respect for what they did."

UH could not make CSUN pay for its poor shooting percentage (31.3 percent), as the Matadors knifed through the lane and earned numerous free-throw attempts (22-for-34).

The defending tournament champion took control midway through the first period, led by seven at halftime and turned back every charge the Wahine made in the second. The Matadors pestered UH all game long with their quick guards, taking UH out of its comfort zone.

The Wahine committed 11 turnovers by halftime — many while attempting post entry passes — and 18 for the game. CSUN committed just nine turnovers.

"I definitely feel like their pressure was more intense," said Beeman, who credited CSUN for their overall performance. "That’s something they’ve done for the last five or six games. We knew it was coming. It wasn’t the actual pressure that got us in the fullcourt. It was what we did with the ball after we advanced it past halfcourt. We couldn’t think, regain our patience and composure to find the open player. When we did find the open player, we just really struggled with the contact."

UH was also frustrated by a lack of friendly whistles, especially in the first half.

"Going up, we weren’t going strong sometimes," Beeman said. "I felt there was a lot of contact but we just were unable to hit good shots. We just really picked a bad night to not hit layups."

The Wahine cut an eight-point deficit to three in the second half, but CSUN countered to go back up double digits in the final minutes.

Halftime — Cal State Northridge 27, Hawaii 20

3-point goals — Cal State Northridge 5-14 (Sharpe 2-3, Guay 1-2, Lister 1-3, Cole 1-5, King 0-1). Hawaii 4-14 (Karaitiana 2-5, King 1-2, Wimbley 1-2, Kuehu 0-1, Huff 0-2, Harris 0-2). Steals — Cal State Northridge 8 (Lister 4, Guay 2, Sharpe, Friess). Hawaii 3 (Segovia, Karaitiana, Kuehu). Turnovers — Cal State Northridge 9 (Mahiknecht 4, Guay, Sharpe, Cole, Boagni, TEAM). Hawaii 18 (Wimbley 4, Harris 4, Toeaina 2, King 2, Segovia 2, Karaitiana 2, Morris, Mason). Assists — Cal State Northridge 7 (Guay 6, Sharpe). Hawaii 13 (King 4, Karaitiana 3, Kuehu 3, Morris, Wimbley, Harris). Blocked shots — Cal State Northridge 2 (Mahiknecht, Boagni). Hawaii 11 (Kuehu 4, Huff 3, King 2, Morris, Karaitiana).Technical fouls — Cal State Northridge none. Hawaii none. Officials — Marianne Karp, Charles Gonzales, Jack Jones. A — 1,415.