Dave Reardon: Hawaii football team makes enough big plays to make up for mistakes

This was the first University of Hawaii football game ever played on campus, so it’s fitting to hand out a couple of grades to the Rainbow Warriors after an exciting but sloppy 49-35 win over Portland State on Saturday.

Stadium security: A+. Ball security: F.

Lots of fan envy was expressed locally as Saturday afternoon wore on, largely because of what had gone on at other college football venues on the first big day of the season, most notably Virginia Tech. A boisterous home crowd undoubtedly helped the Hokies knock off No. 10 North Carolina, and photos of shoulder-to-shoulder, mask-less, fire-breathing fans made their way into countless Hawaii inboxes.

That wasn’t going to happen here, though. Fans were not allowed at the Clarence T.C. Ching Athletic Complex due to COVID-19 numbers.

“A few tried to sneak in,” an HPD officer said. “They left without putting up a fight.”

The Vikings didn’t, though. Portland State never gave up. But fortunately for UH, the visitors didn’t take advantage of all of the hosts’ generosity.

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It was evident from early on that the Warriors had enough talent to do to the Vikings what UCLA did to Hawaii in UH’s season-opener, a 44-10 loss at UCLA last week that wasn’t as close as the final score.

This was different, though, because Hawaii didn’t bother to deliver the knockout punch after going up 28-0 in a first quarter so action-packed that at the end of it the ref announced it as the closing of the first half.

But instead of finishing off the Vikings, UH lost three of six fumbles. That, plus an interception, allowed PSU to keep it more interesting for longer than the Warriors wanted.

Calvin Turner was responsible for three of the fumbles, including an embarrassing one through his legs that resulted in Portland State scoring a touchdown on a kickoff following a PSU touchdown pass. That made it 42-28, with an entire quarter left for the Vikings to try to inflict what would have been a devastating defeat for the Warriors … as bad as the one they handed over-hyped Hawaii in 2000.

But UH made more big plays than mistakes, including Dae Dae Hunter’s 59-yard touchdown run that turned the momentum around early in the fourth quarter and pretty much iced it.

Although this was far from Turner’s best game, he turned in a play worthy of ESPN’s SportsCenter Top 10, even if Hawaii fan Neil Everett isn’t the anchor doing the selecting.

During the first-quarter scoring spree, Turner caught a lateral from Chevan Cordeiro on the right flank, but had no room in front of him. So he glided to his left, all the way to the other side of the field. He outran the entire Portland State defense for what the stats say is a 34-yard TD that actually covered more than 80.

Later, on a punt return, Turner pirouetted twice to turn nothing into a 16-yard return.

If that wasn’t enough to redeem himself for the fumbles and a couple of dropped passes, Turner was spotted doing push-ups on the sideline after one of his miscues.

Cordeiro was mostly solid and sometimes spectacular in bouncing back from a rough outing at UCLA, passing for three touchdowns and 305 yards and rushing for 66 more.

The defense allowed more points and yards than it should to an FCS opponent, but it also turned in a goal-line stand and forced four turnovers after none last week.

Afterward, Graham said he thought reporters would take him to task for calling two timeouts in a row in a key situation. But we’d seen that before, by at least two other UH head coaches.

He addressed the sloppiness before anyone asked.

“I was intensely talking about ball security the whole game. Our ball security was not good — even in the first half we put it in traffic. It’s the biggest thing you can’t do, think that ‘Hey we’re just gonna blow these guys out.”

But it’s still a win, and it was exciting and historic, even though very few got to see it in person.

“We got one in the bank,” Graham said. “A lot of people around the country lost today.”

Those who lost on Saturday include UH’s next four opponents.

Still, the Warriors can’t afford to be as generous as they were Saturday and expect to keep winning in the coming weeks.