During a sauna-humid practice nine days ago, the only thing keeping the Hawaii football team from pau hana time was Ryan Meskell making a field goal.

His 29-yard attempt hooked wide left.

Head coach Nick Rolovich then stormed toward Meskell, ordering the senior to put the next kick between the goal posts. This time, Meskell’s kick was true — ending practice and, seemingly, a mechanical glitch.

“It’s good to hear from the head coach and get blasted,” Meskell said of the snap-to-it moment. “Hearing his voice and saying it to you … Coach has been great. I haven’t been off to the best start in the world. (The coaches) helped me manage the tough situations well.”

Meskell, who had missed five of his previous six field-goal attempts, was not summoned for one in last Saturday’s 35-16 victory over Central Arkansas. But he did convert all five point-after kicks, and smacked four of his six kickoffs into the end zone, with the others landing at the 1 and 2, respectively.

“No field-goal attempts (in that game),” Meskell said, “but as long as I have little wins, whether it’s a straight PAT or touchback, little wins build confidence. I’ll try to have a good game in Nevada.”

The Rainbow Warriors open Mountain West Conference play with Saturday’s road game against Nevada. Meskell welcomes playing in Reno’s 4,506-foot elevation. On fields that are at least 4,000 feet above sea level, Meskell is 4-for-4 on field-goal attempts. He is 14-for-25 at sea level.

On his kickoffs, 21.4% result in touchbacks in high altitude compared to 14.9% at sea level.

“I’m going to kick the ball the same and do what I’ve been practicing over the last week,” Meskell said. “The ball, hopefully, will go a little bit further (in high altitude). That’s the only difference, which is a good thing. I like kicking in altitude.”

Meskell said he has solved an accuracy problem that hindered him against Oregon State, when he hooked his first three attempts. He eventually hit the decisive field goal on his fourth attempt. The following week, he grazed the left upright on a 55-yard attempt and was short on a 49-yarder.

He said he problem was rooted in what he termed a “jab” kick.

“I wasn’t following my leg through when I kicked the ball,” Meskell said. “I kicked the ball and sort of stopped swinging my leg. I jabbed at it, basically. The focus the last two weeks has been on me getting my leg through the ball and up. It’s resulted in better quality kicks in practice. Even the PATs have been better quality.”

The key, he said, is not stray from his usual form.

“I think it was more of an in-my-head thing,” Meskell said. “It was more just needing to relax and stick to the things I trained to do. That’s been the big thing. Go out there and kick the way you practice. If you miss he way you’ve been trained to kick, you can’t be mad at yourself. But if you kick differently to the way you practice and you miss, you can be mad at yourself. That’s kind of what the problem was. Now I go out there and worry about my swing rather than where the ball is going to end up. More often than not, if you do the right thing with the swing, the ball will go where you want it to go.”