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Five-hundred fans or none, the goal remains the same: three wins in four days for March glory.
Today’s Big West tournament second-round match between No. 4 Hawaii and No. 6 Cal State Fullerton at Long Beach State’s Walter Pyramid will be played without spectators in the stands due to the threat of the coronavirus. So will men’s and women’s games through Saturday at the Honda Center, where champions are crowned.
“The timing couldn’t be worse for college sports,” UH coach Laura Beeman said in a phone interview soon after the Big West’s announcement Tuesday. “But this is a bad time for our country and it’s about health and safety and the kids understand. They don’t like it, but they understand it.”
Beeman estimated the Big West’s decision affected some “500 to 600” fans and family of the Wahine who would have attended today’s game. Today’s two winners at the Pyramid (3 p.m. and 5:30 p.m. HST) advance to Friday’s semifinals against No. 1 UC Davis and No. 2 UC Santa Barbara.
“You just have to kind of spin it for the girls and say, ‘hey, it’s not a home game for us anyway. Let’s keep playing for who we play for, which is each other,’ ” Beeman said. “And hopefully we can wrap our brains around that.”
In the first game of the tournament Tuesday, just hours after the announcement, No. 8 Cal Poly upset host and fifth-seeded Long Beach State 59-48. Because of reseeded bracketing, that meant UH would face the winner between Cal State Fullerton and Cal State Northridge.
Fullerton followed by beating CSUN 67-52. Big West Player of the Year Raina Perez came into the week 12th in the country in scoring at 20.3 per game, and extended her run of double-figure scoring games to 15 by putting in 14 points with 11 assists against the Matadors. All-Big West second-team guard Taylor Turney added 27 points.
The Titans (17-13), under third-year coach Jeff Harada, a Hawaii native, have their first winning season since 1990-91. They split their home-and-home series with the Wahine (15-14). Perez scored 34 points in a 79-72 loss to UH at the Stan Sheriff Center on Jan. 18, but the Titans won 70-64 in the rematch at Titan Gym on Feb. 29 despite an off shooting night from her.
The battle of scoring guards is the marquee matchup. UH senior Julissa Tago received All-Big West first-team recognition on Monday after leading UH with a 15.0 scoring average, behind only Perez among backcourt players.
In last year’s UH run to the Big West title game as the second seed, Tago was limited by a shoulder injury and played only a minute in the 58-50 championship loss to top-seeded UC Davis.
“For me, I didn’t play that much, but I do know what it feels like to be there and the preparation it took to get there,” Tago said before departing Honolulu with her team on Monday. “And I did help my team in practice and stuff. Just for the younger ones, it’s like any other game. Obviously we’re playing for different things, but just play your game and be confident, for sure.”
Junior forward Amy Atwell, the BWC Best Sixth Player and an all-league honorable mention, has supplied 10.7 points per game and a league-best 3-point percentage of .449. That represents the third-best season mark in program history and the best since Kylie Page’s .485 in 1997-98.
Tago and Atwell have spearheaded the most prolific 3-point-shooting season in program history. UH broke last year’s record number of long balls made (208) by 20 and counting.
Tago (66) and Atwell (61) surpassed the individual record for 3-pointers in a season, 55 by Megan Tinnin in 2008-09. Tago broke the record for 3s in a game (six) by sinking eight at UC Irvine on Feb. 27.
Beeman spoke of the importance of dialing back the reliance on the 3-ball after a 57-56 loss to UC Santa Barbara on a buzzer beater last Wednesday. On senior night Saturday, UH went the other way instead; half of its shots were 3s, but the Wahine were hitting, going 12-for-26 (46.2%) in a 75-58 rout of Cal Poly to snap a four-game losing streak.
BIG WEST WOMEN’S BASKETBALL
at Walter Pyramid, Long Beach, Calif.
Today
>> No. 3 UC Irvine (13-17) vs. No. 8 Cal Poly (10-18), 3 p.m.
>> No. 4 Hawaii (15-14) vs. No. 6 Cal State Fullerton (17-13), 5:30 p.m.
>> TV: None
>> Live streaming: ESPN3
>> Radio: 1420-AM
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