Rainbow Wahine open Big West season with road win at UC Davis

Lily Wahinekapu led four Hawaii players in double figures with 17 points and the Rainbow Wahine basketball team opened the Big West season with a 70-62 win over UC Davis today at University Credit Union Center in Davis, Calif.

Wahinekapu hit three 3-pointers and forward Kallin Spiller finished with 12 points and 13 rebounds as UH (3-7, 1-0) opened defense of its conference regular-season title with its second road win of the season.

Guard Daejah Phillips and forward Nnenna Orji added 10 points each off the bench for the Rainbow Wahine, who went 20-for-24 from the free-throw line and hit all 11 of their attempts in the fourth quarter.

Victoria Baker led UC Davis (4-7, 0-1) with 16 points on 7-for-11 shooting and Tova Sabel added 15 points with three 3-pointers. Guard Evanne Turner, the Big West’s leading scorer entering the game, finished with nine points on 3-for-13 shooting.

After a cold start for both teams, Sabel, the reigning conference Player of the Week, highlighted a 10-0 UC Davis run with a 3-pointer followed by a layup. She connected on another 3-pointer to trigger an eight-point surge and the Aggies led 23-12 at the end of the first quarter.

UH answered with a 12-0 surge to open the second quarter and took its first lead at 24-23 on Jacque David’s post bucket. Sabel hit her third 3-pointer and the teams combined for three ties before Sydney Burns scored on a driving layup and added two free throws to send UC Davis into halftime with a 35-32 lead.

UC Davis missed its first 10 shots of the third quarter and UH capitalized with a 15-0 run and opened up a 47-35 lead when Orji scored on a drive. Baker broke UC Davis’ cold spell by banking in a jumper in the lane and added another driving bucket and a 3-pointer in a 14-2 Aggies run bridging the quarter break to tie the game 49-49.

The Wahine went on the attack, with Phillips and Wahinekapu drawing fouls on drives and connecting on four free throws to give UH the lead. UC Davis cut a six-point deficit to two when Burns converted a three-point play after her drive. But Wahinekapu scored on a backdoor layup off a feed from David to give UH a 63-59 lead with 41.9 seconds left. The Wahine maintained the lead from the free-throw line and punctuated the win when Phillips found Spiller for a breakaway layup with 3.3 seconds remaining.

UH continues its road trip on Saturday at Cal Poly.