Rainbows stomp Golden Lions

Hawaii couldn’t buy an outside basket against Arkansas-Pine Bluff for most of the night.

Fortunately, the Rainbow Warriors didn’t need to.

UH played inside-out — with the emphasis on inside — in a 75-47 rout of the Golden Lions on Wednesday night at the Stan Sheriff Center.

Coming off their first loss of the season, the Rainbows (5-1) opened up a 10-game homestand in successful fashion in front of a turnstile crowd of 3,175. UH allowed its fewest points since a 47-46 home loss to Nevada on Feb. 14, 2009.

Eran Ganot’s team sputtered a little early against the Lions’ aggressive, trapping zone defense, but closed both halves with runs.

“Concerned with the way we opened the game … but pleased with the way we closed it,” Ganot said. “Other than Texas Tech (an 82-74 road loss Saturday), we’ve finished halves well, and I thought that set the tone for the game.”

The Rainbows went nearly all game without a 3-pointer but compensated with a 42-26 scoring advantage in the paint and a dominant defensive effort. Pine Bluff of the Southwestern Athletic Conference shot just 30.3 percent from the field and earned just four trips to the free-throw line, compared to 50 percent shooting and 33 foul shots for the hosts.

Forward Stefan Jankovic had 14 points and 12 rebounds, while Isaac Fleming and Sai Tummala combined for 25 points off the bench.

“From scouting them and watching film, a lot of teams were able to go inside, because a lot of the pressure was out on the top of the zone,” Jankovic said. “They were weak inside, but we were too to be honest. … I should have finished more down low, but we stuck to the game plan and we did a good job.”

Meanwhile, UH wrought its customary chaos in the open court. Forward Aaron Valdes and guards Roderick Bobbitt, Quincy Smith and Fleming combined for 11 steals.

It was the fourth time in six seasons UH defeated the well-traveled Lions (2-6), who this year play their first 18 games away from home.

The lead ballooned late, even once Ganot inserted his bench mob. Redshirt freshman Zach Buscher capped it off with an elbow jumper for his first career points.

UH converted on 22 of its 33 shots at the line (66.7 percent), an improvement on their season average of sub-60 percent.

“Going down the stretch we didn’t do a very good job of getting in position, and they capitalized on a lot of fouls. They shot a lot of free throws,” said Pine Bluff coach George Ivory, noting a 22-8 disparity in whistles. “Hey, we just got to do a better job of moving our feet and getting in position.”

Pine Bluff’s best player, 6-foot-9 utilityman JoVaughn Love, was bottled up to the tune of 4-for-15 shooting. The Lions’ other top offensive threat, Ghiavonni Robinson, shot 6-for-21, including 2-for-11 on 3s as the Lions went 5-for-28 (17.9 percent) from downtown.

“A little bit of timidness on our end, but overall U of H did a pretty good job defensively too as well,” Ivory said. “(They) did a great job executing and that’s the biggest thing we thought it was.”

Despite being off on its first 10 3-point tries, UH built on an 11-point halftime lead. The result was never really in doubt once Fleming hit six straight free throws to extend it to 50-34 with under 12 minutes to play.

Fleming dove to the ground for a steal and passed ahead to Valdes, who fed Tummala for a two-handed jam and 61-41 advantage with six minutes to go.

Fleming hit UH’s first 3 with 3:47 to go, a contested 26-footer that was all net to beat the shot clock to go up 23. UH finished 1-for-11 from deep.

“If we had an extra 20 minutes, everybody’s 3s would have been dropping,” Fleming said. “We weren’t worried at all.”

Pine Bluff succeeded in mucking up the game early with its trapping D. The Golden Lions capitalized on putback chances to lead briefly, 12-10, then 14-12, before the Rainbows struck back with a 14-4 run.

UH closed the period on a 10-2 spurt to take a 36-25 lead at halftime, despite going 0-for-6 on 3-pointers.

Mike Thomas scored all of his nine points in the first half. He left the game early in the second with what Ganot called back spasms and was described as “day to day.”

Hawaii next plays Hawaii Hilo at the Sheriff on Tuesday.