The ethics of our profession include a cap on the value of a gift that can be accepted from a subject of a story. For many of my 40-plus years as a journalist, it has been $25.

But how do you put a price on history? Particularly one the impact of which is felt to this day?

A piece of that has resided in my home for over six years. It is several shades of purple, 21 inches high and a solid 12 pounds, its weight far less than who and what it represents to the college basketball world.

It is a vase made by the late Tadashi Tadani, whose 91st birthday would have been last Sunday. “T.T.” passed on March 6, 2015, leaving a rich legacy that influenced many a basketball referee and, especially, many a scoreboard operator.

For more than 30 years, Tadashi was a fixture at the Honolulu Civic Auditorium, Blaisdell Arena (formerly the HIC), Aloha Stadium and Stan Sheriff Center. It was an easy transition from his Korean War days as a radio operator (think teletypewriter) to the originally very complicated console that kept time and score for events ranging from roller derby to MMA to basketball.

“He was really good with numbers and he was really quick to put up the score after a basket,” his son, TV personality Tiny Tadani, said when interviewed recently. “If you were at the game live and you looked up at the scoreboard after a basket, the score was already updated.

“Some coaches would come over and complain that the score was wrong, that the basket hadn’t been counted. But the refs would come over, check the scorebook and say, ‘No, it’s right.’ ”

That quickness led to a huge change in how time is now measured on the scoreboard clock in college basketball. It mirrors the change in the sport that, coincidentally, also involves Chaminade.

The Silverswords first earned their reputation as “Giant Killers” when the small NAIA school knocked off then-No. 1 Virginia 77-72 on Dec. 23, 1982, at Blaisdell. Then came the convincing 83-72 upset of Louisville the following year which further planted the seed of what would become “the best in-season tournament in the country,” the late Associated Press basketball editor Jim O’Connell once wrote.

What is now known as the Maui Invitational had very humble beginnings, including not being played on Maui initially. In 1984, it was the modest four-team Hawaiian Airlines Silversword Invitational played the two days after Thanksgiving at Konawaena High Gym on Hawaii Island.

Yes, Virginia, there again was a Chaminade, but the Cavaliers and ’Swords did not meet with Chaminade losing in the title game to Providence and Virginia salvaging the trip with a win over Davidson for third place.

In 1985 and ’86, the tournament was played at War Memorial Gym in Wailuku before finding a permanent home at the Lahaina Civic Center with its signature time slot of the three days before Thanksgiving.

But back to 1984.

A month after the event at Konawaena, Chaminade hosted another four-team tournament with an incredible field: No. 4 SMU with Jon Koncak, No. 20 Louisville and preseason No. 5 Oklahoma with Wayman Tisdale.

The Silverswords upset Louisville for the second straight year, setting up a 1:30 p.m. championship game with SMU on Christmas Day. (The Blaisdell also had the first round of the Rainbow Classic later that day with Maryland-Iowa at 6:40 p.m. followed by Hawaii-Cornell).

The Mustangs were leading 70-69 with 12 seconds to go in what would be a frantic and historic finish. Time appeared to expire with zeros showing on the clock.

But … the horn had not sounded. Officials ruled there was some fraction of a second left, enough time for Mark Rodrigues to get the ball to Keith Whitney, who scored on a touch fadeaway jumper as the horn sounded.

That clock operator? Tadashi Tadani.

“That game (with SMU) changed the whole way game clocks were,” former Chaminade coach Merv Lopes said in Tadani’s 2015 obituary. “They added tenths of seconds after that.”

Few realized then how it would change the game. I certainly didn’t when covering that tournament for both the Associated Press and the Honolulu Star-Bulletin. It was hard enough trying to summarize it in a deadline wire story.

But I am thankful to have a daily reminder of it now at the house, especially as college basketball season approaches. The vase that Tiny Tatadani gifted me after writing his father’s obituary for the Star-Advertiser is filled with artificial flowers and so many memories.

It recalls a time in the 1980s when Hawaii was the capital of preseason college basketball, every one of the state’s six colleges holding at least two holiday tournaments between Thanksgiving and New Year’s.

It led to the Star-Bulletin first having a vote in the AP men’s basketball poll in 1993 because, O’Connell said when recommending it, we saw so many great teams during the preseason. The vote then alternated annually between the Bulletin and the Honolulu Advertiser with the Star-Advertiser still having a voice in the Top 25.

If only walls could talk? Nah, no need. There’s this vase that tells hundreds of stories, including the one of its creator, Tadashi Tadani.