UH returns a ‘core 4’

Things are on the upswing for University of Hawaii baseball. That’s true whether you define it as sluggers hitting balls over the fence — or, as a team joining football and soccer as Manoa programs on ascending arcs, finally halting long years of losing or non-winning records.

The Rainbow Warriors finally displayed something much closer to consistent power during the season that concluded Saturday after a long shortage of long balls. The 29 homers were the most for the Rainbow Warriors in the current BBCOR dead-bat era, and also the most since Hawaii left the high-altitude Western Athletic Conference and joined the pitching-rich Big West Conference.

And coach Mike Trapasso’s team has all but a few of its keys players due back next season after finishing this one with a 28-23 mark.

Football hadn’t had a non-losing season since 2010, and baseball hadn’t had a winning season since 2012.

Football went 7-7 in Nick Rolovich’s first season as head coach last fall, as soccer posted a 9-6-2 mark for its first winning season since 2008 (the Wahine were 8-8-1 in 2013 for their only non-losing record after ’08 and before ’16).

“We are very proud of our student-athletes, coaches and support staff for the upward trends of these programs,” athletic director David Matlin said.

Men’s basketball wasn’t over .500 this past season, but it exceeded expectations to go 14-16 (8-8 in the Big West) after losing nearly everyone from the 2015-16 squad that won the conference championship and an NCAA Tournament game for the first time in school history.

However, UH’s most stable and historically successful program — women’s volleyball, which enjoyed 42 consecutive winning seasons including four national championships under Hall of Fame head coach Dave Shoji — faces a level of future uncertainty with his retirement.

Shoji’s alma mater, UC Santa Barbara, was the baseball team’s opponent for the final competition at Manoa this school year.

The ’Bows had lost six straight after clinching an overall winning record two weeks prior, but displayed trademark resilience in taking the final two games of the series, and the year, Friday and Saturday against UCSB. They did so rallying from a 2-0 deficit Friday and after trailing 6-2 on Saturday.

“You definitely don’t want to lose on senior night, and it was good to finish at home with maybe the best spectator games of the season. They had everything that you’re looking for in a baseball game,” Trapasso said.

It was two teams without postseason hopes, but it didn’t have that vibe.

“If felt like midseason with the intensity and the way our kids were battling,” Trapasso said. “Nice to see them go wire-to-wire with that kind of passion.”

The final 10-14 conference record (following back-to-back 12-12 Big West seasons) is disappointing after the 18-9 nonconference start.

Next year, UH will miss ace starter Brendan Hornung, set-up reliever Casey Ryan, multi-talented third baseman Josh Rojas and slugging outfielder Alex Fitchett. They are among the seven players who graduated this spring. So is Marcus Doi, the oft-injured outfielder from Mid-Pacific who homered and doubled in his finale Saturday; if you take away his hitless first 14 at-bats of the season, Doi would’ve batted .271 instead of .210.

But nearly everyone else is coming back for 2018.

That includes pitchers Dominic DeMiero, Neil Uskali and Jackson Rees, who started all but the 15 games that Hornung did. Closer Dylan Thomas, who saved nine games, will also return.

All of the up-the-middle position starters will be back, too: catcher Kekai Rios, second baseman Johnny Weeks, shortstop Dustin Demeter and center fielder Dylan Vchulek.

“I don’t recall ever having all four returning,” said Trapasso, who has been the Rainbows coach since 2002.

Demeter and Thomas are among a group of freshmen who made huge contributions; it also includes outfielder Adam Fogel (.293, four home runs in 45 games) and first baseman Logan Pouelsen (.276, two homers in 98 at-bats).

The Rainbows are not expected to lose anyone on the returning roster to the MLB draft, Trapasso said.

“It’s easy to say in hindsight, but two years ago after a first couple of tough seasons in the Big West we saw we needed to make some changes in recruiting philosophy,” Trapasso said. “We really did start from scratch with a class heavy on JC transfers, but then no question we were fortunate to get four guys (last year) that we felt when we signed them they could all potentially go pro but we got all four of them. That’s how it starts; talent is still the No. 1 commodity that makes teams win and makes coaches seem smarter.”