HONOLULU — With one of the greats of not-too-distant Hawaii basketball lore in the house at the Stan Sheriff Center, the Rainbow Warrior basketball team had a chance to summon a callback effort to different times in a crucial Big West game.
Stefan Jankovic, the former Big West Player of the Year who was part of coach Eran Ganot’s first season in 2015-16, was in town with his fiancée and two-month-old son, Luka, and appeared as the honorary game captain for UH against UC Riverside on Thursday night.
A 6-foot-11 pro who’s played around the globe over the last decade but hadn’t visited Honolulu recently, Jankovic was struck watching the 2024-25 edition of the ‘Bows, who struggled to an 82-76 loss, their eighth in 10 games.
[Note: See below for more photos of UC Riverside-Hawaii basketball.]
“I feel like since I left there hasn’t been that kind of hype,” mused Jankovic, the former Big West Player of the Year who helped lead UH to its first NCAA Tournament victory and a program-record 28 wins. “I hope there will be. As an alumni, I’d hope to see us do even better than even the year we had.”
Stretches of competitiveness could not be prolonged into a victory in front of a subdued crowd of 2,354 (4,229 tickets issued) as the Rainbow Warriors (14-14, 6-11 BWC) remained in free fall, having lost eight of 10 with the Big West tournament far from a certainty.
For the first time in its 13 seasons in the Big West, UH is assured a losing conference record.
The eighth-place ‘Bows’ biggest concern now is just getting to Henderson, Nev., for the eight-team Big West championships, and avoid becoming one of the three teams left at home. Cal State Bakersfield (7-11), thanks to Jemel Jones’ overtime buzzer winner over Long Beach State, surpassed UH in the standings Thursday night.
Cal Poly (5-12) is one game back but with a far favorable closing three-game schedule of CSUB and last-place Cal State Fullerton at home, then 10th-place LBSU on the road.
After Saturday’s senior night game against UC Davis (9-8), UH faces Bakersfield and third-place Cal State Northridge (12-5) on the road to close.
Ganot, the 10th-year coach, took a moment to compose himself before speaking in the postgame press conference.
Effort, a factor Ganot called out himself following a program-record 39-point Big West loss at leader UC San Diego on Saturday, was better on Thursday. The Rainbow Warriors even got an elusive big game from forward Gytis Nemeiksa, whose 17 points off the bench was his most in the last 10 games. Wing Ryan Rapp connected on four 3-pointers and scored 16 and freshman Aaron Hunkin-Claytor had a season-high 11 points and five assists.
“I just wanted to bring energy,” Nemeiksa said. “We had a tough game at San Diego, so I just wanted to bring energy, as I was doing in the beginning of the season. That’s it, just play hard as I can.”
As has been the case all too often in 2024-25, it was not enough.
UH, which lost one of its better guard defenders Kody Williams to a season-ending wrist fracture in practice earlier in the week, struggled to contain UCR’s chief scoring and playmaking threat, Barrington Hargress, and another shifty guard in Isaiah Moses.
“Especially the stretch when they separated, there was really poor point-of-attack defense,” Ganot said.
He lamented the collapse of UH’s secondary defense, its “wall.”
“They had wide-open shots in the corners, which means nobody rotated,” he said.
Hargress erupted for 25 points on 9-for-19 shooting while Moses added 14.
UH didn’t commit turnovers in bunches like other times this season, but UCR made the most of the 11 it forced and rung up a 16-5 advantage in points off turnovers.
Center Tanner Christensen took a seat after picking up two quick fouls, a frequent occurrence of late. The ‘Bows leaned on Nemeiksa and capitalized in transition to take a one-point halftime lead but fell behind for good with under 15 minutes left.
UH beat UCR (19-11, 12-6) by seven in Riverside on Jan. 9, but UCR missed starting center Joel Armotrading in that one and Williams had one of his better defensive games in frustrating Hargress to an inefficient night.
Highlanders coach Mike Magpayo said he anticipated a level of desperation from UH with its season on the brink.
“We were there last year ourselves,” Magpayo said. “We had to close strong, and you got to keep them together. And I know Coach Ganot, I mean, we're very similar. I always say this, if you come to our practice, it's going to look a lot like their practice. There's a lot of coaching family ties. So absolutely, I knew that there was going to be a lot of purpose and desperation.”
UH will have to replicate it, and then some, for Saturday’s game against Davis, who feature one of the league’s best scorers in guard TY Johnson. The Aggies had a bye Thursday and have had a week to prepare.
“We've got three games. I've I still believe in this group,” said the co-captain Rapp, one of five seniors to be honored Saturday along with Nemeiksa, Marcus Greene, Jerome Palm and Christensen. “Everyone in the locker room still believes in this group that we can do it. We just got to keep battling and fight through this adversity. I think we're going to come back out better on the other side.”
Ganot, who continues to insist his team has not fractured during its struggles, said he didn’t have a doubt the players would come to play. He mentioned Williams as an example.
“It's a humbling world, and you got to honor the blessing we have to compete when sometimes your seasons are already over, or some guys don't get to,” Ganot said.
Brian McInnis covers the state’s sports scene for Spectrum News Hawaii. He can be reached at brian.mcinnis@charter.com.