A matchup of similar styles awaits the UH-Hilo men’s basketball team Monday when it hosts Fresno Pacific at Hilo Civic with an opportunity for the Vulcans to win their third consecutive game.
A matchup of similar styles awaits the UH-Hilo men’s basketball team Monday when it hosts Fresno Pacific at Hilo Civic with an opportunity for the Vulcans to win their third consecutive game.
“They really have a good offense,” UH Hilo coach GE Coleman said of the Sunbirds, third in the Pacific West Conference with an 86.3 points per game average. “Watching them on tape, its a very well-coached team, a dangerous team.”
Fresno Pacific is 4-5 (8-7 overall), tied for ninth in the conference, which doesn’t sound too scary and the Sunbirds are coming off a loss Saturday at Chaminade where they gave up 114 points in a 114-91 defeat that included surrendering 63 points in the first half. That’s not the scary part.
“They went into BYU (Hawaii) and won by 25 (97-72 last Thursday), and that just doesn’t happen,” Coleman said. “We have to play a lot better.”
UH Hilo (2-5, 2-9), won its second straight game last Thursday, holding on for a 72-69 win over Academy of Art despite 18 turnovers and a 2-3 zone defense that got exposed right through the middle in the second half.
“We just can’t have that many turnovers,” Coleman said, “and our defense just fell apart.”
Vulcans’ women’s coach David Kaneshiro knows what that’s like after his defense was virtually disabled by conference leader Art U (9-0), 86-53 Thursday in Hilo, but this game provides a wildly different perspective on the conference.
Fresno Pacific is 0-9 and 2-13 overall this season, so UH Hilo (2-4, 2-9), will go from the only undefeated conference team to the only winless conference team in back-to-back games.
In order to get back in the win column, the Vulcans need to jolt the offense which ranks last in the conference, averaging just 52.3 points per game, led by freshman Kim Schmelz, with a 13.8 average.
The Vulcans defeated Fresno Pacific in the only game between the schools last year with a 60-58 win that capped a sweep of a three-game road trip to Northern California.
The UH Hilo women tip off at 5 p.m. with the men’s game to follow.