Nick Rolovich and Dru Brown definitely know the way to San Jose. The question this week will be if they and the rest of the University of Hawaii football team will know the way to win on the road when they play the Spartans on Saturday afternoon.
The UH coach and starting quarterback are both from the Bay Area. Brown went to Los Gatos High School, which is about a 15-minute drive from CEFCU Stadium, the site of Hawaii’s first Mountain West away game of the season.
Apparently, when determining the early line the Vegas odds-makers weren’t feeling the buzz of the Rainbow Warriors’ 38-17 rout of Nevada (yes, rout, as the Wolf Pack’s two touchdowns came way after the issue was decided). The Spartans were listed as a 3 1/2 to 4 1/2 favorite Sunday. That will likely have changed by the time you read this today.
San Jose State is 1-4 and coming off a 48-41 loss at New Mexico.
Hawaii’s underdog status for this game probably has to do with its road record and reputation. UH (2-3) is 0-3 away from Aloha Stadium.
All of those losses are against Power Five conference opponents, but UH hasn’t won a road game of any kind since Nov. 15, 2014, a total of 10 losses away from the islands.
Opponent and location of that last victory? San Jose State and Spartan Stadium. (It’s the same 83-year-old venue, but now named CEFCU because of a big sponsorship deal with a credit union.)
Hawaii came out on top on the scoreboard 13-0 that day, but I hesitate to use the word “beat” because it was one of the strangest football games I or anyone else there that day had ever seen.
San Jose State out-gained Hawaii 462 yards to 240, with 24 first downs to 11. The Spartans didn’t punt.
But UH’s defense was great and San Jose’s offense was terrible in the red zone. And the Warriors special teams were spectacular, with two blocked kicks, two field goals by Tyler Hadden and Scott Harding forcing a turnover with his Aussie-style punting.
Regardless of how it happened, it goes down as a win for UH — the only road victory and the only shutout win in Norm Chow’s four seasons.
You have to go back three years prior, to 2011, for more road wins. Hawaii was still in the Western Athletic Conference — as were Louisiana Tech and Idaho, both of whom UH beat: 44-26 at Ruston and 16-14 at Moscow.
Back then, Rolovich was on the Hawaii coaching staff.
When he was the Nevada offensive coordinator, the Wolf Pack went 3-0 against San Jose State, averaging 32 points per game. That includes a 21-10 victory at San Jose seven weeks before UH won there in 2014.
Rolovich will surely preach playing all the way through this week. It didn’t matter against Nevada that UH was outscored 14-0 in the fourth quarter Saturday. San Jose State is averaging a yield of 41 points per game, but the Spartans didn’t give up at New Mexico and fought their way back into the game despite trailing 41-20 with 12 minutes left.
Do the Warriors know the way to win at San Jose?
As weird as it was, they did two years ago.
And maybe, judging from Saturday’s performance against Nevada, they do now in a more conventional way. But they might need to keep their feet on the gas for all 60 minutes if they want to remain unbeaten in the Mountain West.
Reach Dave Reardon at dreardon@staradvertiser.com or 529-4783. His blog is at Hawaiiwarriorworld.com/quick-reads.
