Rainbow Wahine soccer season ends with Big West tournament loss

Hawaii came a long way but has a long way to go to win a Big West soccer championship.

Top-seeded Cal State Fullerton took it to the Rainbow Wahine from the outset and advanced to Sunday’s Big West title game at UH’s expense with a 3-0 semifinal victory on Titan Field on Thursday in Fullerton, Calif.

“We only had one goal this year, and it was to make it to the Big West Conference (tournament for the first time),” coach Michele Nagamine said in a postgame phone interview. “I suppose maybe we should’ve talked about trying to win the first game, but no, we played a Fullerton team that was very seasoned and very experienced, and tonight they were the better team, no ifs ands or buts about that.”

UH showed a tendency all season to come out slow and turn it up in the second half. It lived up to its reputation Thursday — but this time the Titans proved too good to come back on. UH did to earn a 1-1 draw at CSF on Oct. 20.

Savannah Sloniger (ninth minute), Maddie Bennett (16th) and Haley Brown (51st) scored to bring the Wahine season to a close at 6-8-4 overall. The fleet Titans sprung past UH on counterattacks for two of the goals, and put in the third on a misclear. Another second-half score was negated by an offsides call.

Fullerton (13-2-4) faces second-seeded Cal State Northridge (12-6-3), which beat UC Santa Barbara 1-0 in overtime preceding UH’s match. An automatic NCAA tournament berth will be on the line Sunday.

The Wahine were in their first conference tournament game since 2011, their final season in the Western Athletic Conference. UH hasn’t won a tournament game since the 2007 WAC tournament, the only time it advanced to the NCAAs.

“We recognize it tonight — our youth and inexperience showed,” Nagamine said. “We’ve never been here, and now with the perspective the young players have, and it’s not even the preparation, it’s the spectacle of the event. Having the 7:30 game against the host team, the No. 1 seed, I think it was just a little overwhelming.”

UH’s conference regular-season record of 4-1-3 was its first above .500 in eight years in the league, surprising the league’s coaches, who tabbed the Wahine to finish seventh. Nagamine was named Big West Coach of the Year on Wednesday, while senior Alexis Mata was the Goalkeeper of the Year. Mata had seven saves in her final match, including five in the first 15 minutes as the Titans opened with a barrage — the first eight shots were theirs.

“Now we go home, do some tinkering, and talk about how we get back to the Big West,” Nagamine said.