It wasn’t exactly a New Year’s Eve spectacular in the Mott Athletics Center on Saturday.
Even so, closing 2022 with a 2-0 start to conference play looked awfully nice to University of Hawaii women’s basketball coach Laura Beeman. The Rainbow Wahine rallied for a 50-47 Big West win over Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo, Calif.
“It definitely was not pretty, but ugly wins are better than pretty losses any day of the week,” Beeman said in a postgame phone interview. “So we found a way to get it done two nights on the road with really hard travel. I’m incredibly proud of this group for being resilient and grinding it out.”
Forward Kallin Spiller scored nine of her season-high 18 points in the fourth quarter to help the Rainbow Wahine (4-7 overall) earn the program’s first 2-0 conference start since the 2002-03 season as a member of the Western Athletic Conference.
On an otherwise cold shooting afternoon for UH, Spiller, a 6-foot-3 graduate student, went 6-for-8 from the field with three 3-pointers and grabbed five rebounds.
“From last year to this year, she has just been a rock for this team,” Beeman said. “Now she’s doing it on the offensive and defensive end and giving us great rebounds. She has been a real pillar for this team and it’s nice to see.”
As a team, UH overcame a 29% shooting performance from the field to complete a sweep of the opening road trip of the Big West season. The Wahine went 4-for-23 from the field in the first half and went into the break trailing 23-14 after their lowest scoring half of the season.
As in Thursday’s 70-62 win at UC Davis, UH attacked the basket in the second half and drew 15 Cal Poly fouls after the break. Nearly half of Hawaii’s scoring came in one-point increments in finishing 23-for-32 from the free-throw line while Cal Poly went 5-for-6.
UH guard Olivia Davies went 7-for-9 from the free throw line to finish with nine points.
“It was huge in the second half when we started to put our heads down and really drive hard,” Beeman said. “Daejah (Phillips) and Liv were going crazy hard to the basket.”
Spiller’s production helped UH win its 10th straight against Big West competition dating back to last season on an afternoon when its top two scorers, guard Lily Wahinekapu (11.1 points per game) and Phillips (11.7), combined for 10 points on 1-for-11 shooting from the field.
Cal Poly (3-7, 0-2) opened the first and second quarters with 8-0 runs while Hawaii went 1-for-12 in a five-point second quarter.
Spiller hit two 3-pointers in a 10-2 UH run to open the third quarter. The Wahine also turned up the defensive intensity by extending their zone press and forcing three of Cal Poly’s five shot-clock violations in the second half.
“We had to figure out a way to get us energized, get some excitement,” Beeman said. “We were looking at the press to take time off the clock so we could get our halfcourt defense set a little bit better and it generates a little shift in momentum.”
After UH freshman Jovi Lefotu’s driving layup forced the game’s first tie at 26-26, Cal Poly’s Annika Shah hit two 3-pointers in another 8-0 run and the Mustangs took a 36-33 lead into the fourth quarter.
Trailing 41-37, UH held Cal Poly without a field goal over the next 5:51 and took its first lead at 42-41 on a Spiller free throw with 4:30 left.
Spiller scored inside off an assist from Phillips to give UH a 44-43 lead and her jumper with 58 seconds left extended the lead to 48-45.
After two Cal Poly free throws and one from Phillips, the Mustangs missed two shots to tie and Davies came down with the rebound with 8.9 seconds left. Davies made one of two from the line and Cal Poly’s last second 3-pointer was off the mark.
Cal Poly guard Junie Dickson scored all of her team-high 11 points in the first half. ‘Iolani graduate Taylor Wu led the Mustangs with four assists off the bench.
The Wahine are scheduled to return to Honolulu today and face UC San Diego (4-8, 1-1) in their Big West home opener Thursday at SimpliFi Arena at Stan Sheriff Center. They’ll take on Cal State Fullerton (5-6, 0-2) on Saturday.
