while most folks here were focusing on football, the basketball team completed a very disappointing road trip, losing to Pepperdine and Pacific. Lets be honest. Neither of these teams are all that good. Both were picked preseason to finish near the bottom of their respective leagues. So although they are road losses, they are games Hawaii was expected to win ( at least by me).

The team is now 2-4. Frankly, i predicted they would be 5-1 with the only expected loss coming against Gonzaga. The team is showing some areas that need improvement. Team wise, they are not defending the lane very well and they are not shooting well. Opponents have shot 20 more free throws. They are being out rebounded on the offensive boards by 13 leading to too many easy put-backs. And turnovers continue to be an issue with Hawaii turning the ball over 95 times in 6 games.

Individually, Zane is really struggling from the field. Against Pacific, for example, he shot 2-10 from the field and scored 9 points. I said earlier that if Zane scores under 15, Hawaii likely loses and that is proving true so far this young season. Shag's shooting percentage is barely over 30 percent. Against Pacific, he was 2-9. In the Pepperdine game,  Brereton shot well and gave the Rainbow Warriors a third scorer. But he really needs to become more consistant from the field 

Vander continues to under perform. Its not that he is not having average performances. Its that so much was expected of him preseason. And Thomas is good and bad. He has committed 24 fouls in 111 minutes, but has played better in the last two games.

On the positive side, the team continues to play solid perminiter defense holding opponents to a shooting percentage under 40%.  Teams are shooting only 28% from three. And it is holding its own on the defensive boards.

The next three home games should be easy wins. The team should have a winning record going into the Diamond Head Classic, but then things get tough.  I am not ready to say how i think this team will fare in the Conference just yet, but i think any objective observer has to be disappointed in the way things have gone so far. Can the team turn things around. You bet. Just look at last year where the team lost its first 5 conference games before going 9-4 the rest of the way. But last year, the team started the season by winning 7 of its first 9 so it has some work to do in the next few weeks