A 10-2 record to start a baseball season always looks good on the surface.
But they are not all created equally.
In 2021, which was former University of Hawaii coach Mike Trapasso’s last season, the Rainbows started 10-2. But seven of those wins were against Division II teams Hawaii Pacific and Hawaii Hilo.
The average number of runs scored in four victories over the Sharks was 10, and the Rainbows crossed the plate in double figures in all of the one-sided games. The first two wins against the Vulcans were closer, but the finale was 13-0.
The Rainbows played 10 games under .500 the rest of the season, and finished 24-26 overall (including 16-24 in the Big West conference).
After that season, it was exit Trapasso, enter Rich Hill.
The 10-2 mark owned by UH now, four years later, is much different. The ’Bows started with a four-game sweep of Marshall, which is now on a four-game winning streak. After taking three of four from Wichita State, the Rainbows did the same against Northeastern. That series concluded with a 12-inning, 3-2 walk-off win Monday night.
It was UH’s sixth win by one or two runs, and its fourth walk-off victory.
None of these three opponents are ranked, and, yes, UH enjoyed the homefield advantage for all 12 games.
But you get a whole lot more out of close games this early in the season than what amounts to batting practice against teams from a lower division.
And, unless the sport is hockey, no coach is going to publicly celebrate a fight, like the brief scrum the Rainbows and Huskies participated in after UH’s extra-innings, series-ending win Monday. Hill got in the middle of it to put all of his energy to stop it quickly before it could turn into a brawl. He’s sincere when he says there’s no place for that kind of thing in baseball.
But, somewhere deep inside, he had to be smiling just a little bit. You can’t have full-on fights in baseball, but you need that fighting spirit and willingness to step up for your teammates.
Monday’s hard-fought win that ended with Matthew Miura’s single up the middle was even more rewarding than the other nail-biters for a couple of reasons. First, it took 12 innings, and the extra doses of tension and grit that entails. Secondly, after this walk-off, the Rainbows now fly off. They open Big West play with a three-game set at UC Riverside on Friday with plenty of momentum in their carry-ons.
“That can galvanize a team,” said Spectrum TV analyst and former Rainbows pitcher Sam Spangler, minutes after the win. “I can guarantee you the lights are going on and off (in the locker room) and water is getting sprayed around.”
In Hill’s first three seasons, the ’Bows started 6-6 twice and then 7-5 last year.
In every season with him as coach they’ve finished with a better record than the previous one. They were 28-24 in 2022, 29-20 in ’23, and 37-16 in ’24.
Some of those first 12 games in earlier years were on the road, so it is fair to pose that as a question for this edition.
But so far, they’ve had all the right answers, like when Hill and Jared Quandt were asked about the lack of home runs following Saturday night’s 7-1 loss when Northeastern cleared the fence at Les Murakami Stadium three times, and the ’Bows had just once in 10 games.
They said all the right things about on-base percentage being more important (and they’re right), and tomorrow being another day.
Then, on that next day, Quandt and Xaige Lancaster blasted round-trippers in Hawaii’s 11-3 pounding of the Eagles, with starter Liam O’Brien yielding just a bunt single in seven shutout innings.
Quandt drove in five runs and Ben Zeigler-Namoa four.
As in other years when UH fields some of its best teams in various sports, these Rainbows are a combination of talent from lots of other places, and Hawaii.
The successful teams don’t always bond as brothers or sisters so early in the season, with so many narrow victories.
That’s why a bunch of one-run wins in February and early March might be more of a signal of things to come than a bunch of blowouts.
Even after the one-sided loss to Northeastern on Saturday, Hill was thrilled because of the stellar performance of pitcher Itsuki Takemoto.
“I think it’s a harbinger of things to come,” Hill said.
The walk-off wins are, too.
