Every year, coach Michele Nagamine wants to open the Hawaii soccer season with a bang.
Her 18-game 2015 schedule is no exception.
UH opens against Pac-12 powerhouses Stanford and Cal in the Outrigger Resorts Soccer Classic at Waipio Peninsula Soccer Stadium on Aug. 21 and 23. It’s the latest example of the Rainbow Wahine front-loading their nonconference slate.
They faced Arizona State and Texas to kick things off in 2014, going 0-2 in what would ultimately become a 7-10-1 (2-5-1 Big West) season.
Stanford reached the NCAA tournament final four last season. Cal advanced to the NCAA round of 32.
"I think it’s going to be a fantastic weekend," said Nagamine, UH’s fifth-year coach. "We try to really bring in quality opposition here that first week … it seems we’re kind of building that first weekend into the premier weekend of the (nonconference) season."
The next weekend, the Wahine host Wyoming of the Mountain West Conference and Denver of the Summit League in the Outrigger Resorts No Ka Oi tournament.
From there, UH is on the road for four of its next five games — two at West Coast Conference teams Portland State and San Francisco and two at Mountain West schools UNLV and Nevada — to prepare for the rigors of the conference season.
"We still have a very young team, because we only have three seniors," Nagamine said. "We wanted to make sure the schedule that we had was gonna be challenging, but not overwhelming. I think in the past we had some overwhelming schedules where the degree of difficulty was just really, really tough. So we wanted to balance that out with quality teams, no creampuffs, but teams that were going to come in and have NCAA tournament experience, conference championship experience. Because that’s what’s going to help us be better and build our program the way that we’re trying to build it."
UH returns NSCAA all-region selection Storm Kenui at midfield. Kenui and returning defender Lidia Battaglia earned All-Big West second-team honors last season. Forward Kama Pascua was an honorable mention. In addition, UH gets back senior forward Tiana Fujimoto, who missed all of last season with a foot injury. Fujimoto was UH’s only Big West first-team selection to date, in 2013.
The Wahine are still shooting for their first Big West tournament appearance; they must finish in the top four among nine teams to advance to Fullerton, Calif., for a chance at an automatic NCAA berth. UH’s best finish since joining the league in 2012 has been fifth.
UH opens Big West play at home against UC Santa Barbara on Oct. 1.
WAHINE SCHEDULE
All times HST; * — Big West match
August
Outrigger Resorts Soccer Classic
21 — BYU vs. California, 4:30 p.m.; Stanford, 7 p.m.
23 — California, 5 p.m.
24 — Stanford vs. BYU, 7 p.m.
Outrigger Resorts No Ka Oi
27 — Wyoming, 7 p.m.
29 — Denver vs. Wyoming, 7 p.m.
31 — Denver, 7 p.m.
September
4 — at Portland State, 10 a.m.
6 — at San Francisco, 8 a.m.
12 — Cal State Bakersfield, 7 p.m.
18 — at UNLV, 4 p.m.
20 — at Nevada, 10 a.m.
24 — BYU-Hawaii, 7 p.m.
27 — Alumnae game, 5 p.m.
October
1 — UC Santa Barbara*, 7 p.m.
4 — Cal Poly*, 5 p.m.
9 — at UC Riverside*, 7 p.m.
11 — at Cal State Fullerton*, 5 p.m.
18 — CSUN*, 5 p.m.
22 — at UC Davis*, 1 p.m.
25 — at Long Beach State*, 3 p.m.
29 — UC Irvine*, 7 p.m.
November
Big West tournament, Fullerton, Calif.
5 — Semifinals, TBA
8 — Championship, TBA
