Three Hawaii Pacific men’s basketball players received PacWest Conference honors and Sharks’ head coach Darren Vorderbruegge was named the conference’s Coach of the Year on Wednesday.
Sharks senior guard Connor Looney was named the Defender of the Year, while senior guard/forward Chauncey Orr received first-team accolades and senior guard Jordan Martin was placed on the second team.
Hawaii Pacific (26-2, 18-2) won the PacWest Conference regular-season title and is the No. 1 seed in the conference tournament that begins today, but will play in the Friday 5:15 p.m. semifinal against the winner of Azusa Pacific and Chaminade.
Chaminade junior guard Austin Pope was named the PacWest’s Newcomer of the Year. The Silverswords also had senior guard Rohndell Goodwin named to the first team, while senior guard Kiran Shastri made second team. Senior guard Kuany Kuany and Pope were named to the third team. As the No. 4 seed, the Silverswords play fifth-seed Azusa Pacific in a quarterfinal today at 5:15 p.m.
Hawaii-Hilo senior guard Parker Farris was placed on the PacWest second team.
Chaminade’s Castro wins award
Five-time PacWest Freshman of the Week winner, Chaminade’s Destiny Castro, was named the Conference’s Freshman of the Year on Wednesday. She’s the first Chaminade women’s basketball player to receive an individual award. Castro led all PacWest freshmen in scoring (11.0 ppg).
Hawaii Pacific’s Breanna Mackenzie was named to the first team, while teammates VeAnne Navarro (third team) and Gabriella Fotu (honorable mention) also received honors. The Sharks (20-5, 17-3 PacWest) are tied for second in the conference, but are the third seed in this week’s PacWest Conference Tournament. They will play sixth seed Dominican in a quarterfinal today at 10:30 a.m.
BYU-Hawaii’s Safia Sheikh received third-team PacWest honors, while teammate Kristin Baldwin was named to the honorable mention team.
Swish cancel 2 games next week
The Hawaii Swish ABA team has canceled two games against the Orange County Novastars at the Blaisdell Arena next week because of a conflict with the ABA playoffs, Swish owner Geremy Robinson said Wednesday.
Refunds for the two canceled games on Monday and Tuesday will be available at the Blaisdell box office. Robinson said the team will resume its schedule on March 11 against either the Novastars or the San Diego Surf, preceded by a high school all-star game.
The Swish improved to 2-0 with a 97-84 win over the Tucson Buckets at the Blaisdell on Tuesday.
Melounova earns BWC tennis honor
University of Hawaii women’s tennis player Petra Melounova received the Big West Conference’s women’s tennis Athlete of the Week honor on Wednesday. The freshman from the Czech Republic, won both of her singles and doubles matches this past week. It’s her second such honor of the season.
Melounova did not play in Wednesday’s match at UC Riverside due to the NCAA’s number of matches limitations per player; UH won the match 7-0. The Rainbow Wahine (7-2, 4-0 Big West) remain on the road with a nonconference match at San Diego State on Saturday.
