A troubling theme tagged along with the University of Hawaii basketball team on its second road trip of the season.

The Rainbow Warriors’ struggles on the defensive end of the court extended into an 83-67 loss at Cal State Fullerton on Friday at Titan Gym in Fullerton, Calif.

After being swept in a home series with Cal State Bakersfield last week, the ’Bows saw Cal State Fullerton guard Tray Maddox Jr. score 23 points and Dante Maddox Jr. added 20 to lead a hot-shooting Titans attack that sent UH to its fourth consecutive loss.

Tray Maddox shot 8-for-12 from the field, including 5-for-7 from 3-point range, and the Titans (4-4, 3-4 Big West Conference) snapped a five-game losing streak in the series with the Rainbow Warriors (3-4, 1-4).

“They were pretty comfortable, obviously, we let both Maddox Jrs. get loose and we were hurt inside once again,” UH coach Eran Ganot said in a phone interview.

“I think the constant theme of the night was our inability to guard. … It was every which way, on the perimeter and inside.”

The Rainbows will try to bounce back in today’s rematch to complete the two-game series. Tip-off is set for 3 p.m. Hawaii time.

They’ll try to come up with an answer for a Cal State Fullerton offense that often spread the floor and found open shooters on the perimeter or on cuts into the lane.

Dante Maddox Jr. went 3-for-6 from long range and forward Vincent Lee found room inside to score 14 points on 7-for-10 shooting. Forward Doctor Bradley contributed 13 points off the bench and the Titans scored 40 points in the paint to UH’s 26.

The shooting of Dante Maddox and Bradley accounted for the bulk of the Titans’ 36-11 advantage in bench points.

Cal State Fullerton nearly led wire-to-wire in shooting 54% from the field, going 9-for-18 from long range, to UH’s 39% in the Titans first win in the series since a 69-66 victory in Manoa on Jan. 27, 2018.

“Lee’s improved and they’ve improved in terms of shooting the ball and sharing the ball more this year. You have to give them credit,” Ganot said. “I appreciate how our guys fought back, but we couldn’t make more inroads because of our inability to defend consistently.

“We missed some good looks, we missed a lot of shots around the rim and we didn’t do a good job of getting to the (free-throw) line. We had to shot at a really high level with the way we were guarding.”

Hawaii guard Justin Webster scored 14 of his team-high 20 points in the first half and finished 5-for-8 on 3-point attempts. Junior Madut added 12 points for the ’Bows and freshman guard Biwali Bayles had nine points and nine rebounds.

UH played without guard Noel Coleman and forward Bernardo da Silva due to injuries. Ganot said Coleman, who started five games, made the trip and his status is “day to day.” Da Silva played in 25 games with four starts as a freshman but has seen limited minutes in five appearances this season and remained in Honolulu this week.

Cal State Fullerton took a 42-35 lead into halftime and opened up a double-digit advantage early in the second half. UH closed to 55-48 with 12:14 left when Bayles came up with a steal and found Webster for a transition 3. But the Titans answered when Jalen Harris scored while drawing a foul and Tray Maddox drained a 3-pointer to push the lead back 13.

UH would get no closer than nine the rest of the way and the Titans continued to pull away.

“We have to find a way to dig deep and it feels like the same theme, can’t put all three facets together,” Ganot said. “We have to continue to fight and come together, that’s the bottom line.”