Dave Reardon: Hawaii men could have used help in close games

When is a team just plain old bad in clutch situations and when does a good team just suffer from bad luck?

I’ve been trying to figure that one out for a long time. It’s definitely case-by-case.

The University of Hawaii men’s basketball team finished 22-11 after falling 62-60 to Cal State Fullerton in the conference tournament. It was the third loss by one or two points, and if we add the 3-point loss to Yale, UH lost by one possession in four games. More than half of their defeats (six) were by five points or less.

Is that bad luck, or bad basketball coaching and playing in crunch time?

Someone asked me early in the season what I thought of the Rainbows this year. My answer was a safe one that I often give if I think saying “I don’t know” would be rude: “I like the starting five, but I’m not so sure about their depth.”

UH played aggressively on defense — which is a good thing, most of the time. But it can lead to fatigue and more fouls.

Players are often tired, and they don’t even know they are because they’re so focused on what they’re trying to do. Also, if they are tired late in a close game, they’re not going to tell the coach they’re gassed and come out of the game. I’ve seen a lot of strange things in basketball games, but never that.

I wished they still had the guy from Canada and Princeton, Jerome Desrosiers, this year. He was one of those steady players who holds everything together, and the kind of player you want on your side in tough situations.

Actually UH still did have Desrosiers, but as a graduate manager, not as a player. He’s pretty good as a radio analyst, too.

The reason I bring up Desrosiers is that he should have been on this year’s team, and if he were, they might still be playing — yes, in the NCAA Tournament, or at least the NIT. Desrosiers would have been a difference-maker in those close losses — probably not with buzzer-beating bombs, but pretty much anything else.

He petitioned the NCAA and the Ivy League for an extra year because of COVID-19, like the other conferences allow. But the answer was no, and Desrosiers didn’t get his additional season.

This seemed very unfair to him, and the Rainbows. Why was a player who is now in Hawaii and the Big West penalized by a stupid ruling by the conference he transferred from?

He might get something else from the Ivy League, though.

Two Brown basketball players — Grace Kirk of the women’s team and Tamenang Choh, who played on the men’s team from 2017 through 2022 — are suing the Ivy League for not allowing athletic scholarships.

If they receive class-action status, Desrosiers could be among the beneficiaries of any financial award or settlement.

Desrosiers was the kind of player that would have helped UH in close games … or any games, actually.

Almost any way you look at it, UH was horrible in close games, especially when you consider their overall winning percentage of .667.

Despite all that, the season highlight for Hawaii was in a game decided by one point. It was on Christmas Day at the Sheriff Center, the final day of the Hawaiian Airlines Diamond Head Classic.

JoVon McClanahan hit a buzzer-beating 3-pointer from about 30 feet to give UH a 58-57 win over SMU.

You could call it lucky — or you could say Hawaii earned the victory by grinding its way back from a 12-point deficit in the second half to put itself in position for a chance.

However you describe it, it was a beautiful thing for the ’Bows, who climbed to 9-3.

But if you have a choice, you want to be on the right side of those miracle wins and collect your most memorable moments in March, not December.