All things being equal, four years is time enough to construct a college basketball team with any sort of competitive past, into one capable of challenging the top of whatever conference that school may be in. ADVERTISING All things being
All things being equal, four years is time enough to construct a college basketball team with any sort of competitive past, into one capable of challenging the top of whatever conference that school may be in.
Four years means your first recruits have come and gone, you’ve had more than enough opportunity to understand the specifics in evolved in the kind of recruits you need. After four years, it’s time to make a run.
This is all theoretical, and would not include a school that was just launching its first such athletic program, but for the broad swath of four year schools, four years should be enough.
Still, there are always outliers and we happen to live in a place with the outlier that tops all other outliers in the NCAA. If the University of Hawaii at Hilo changed its nickname to the Outliers, we would all understand from the only school in the nation that requires air travel for a game, home or away.
Mix in a budget that often spends little more than half the scholarship money allowed by the NCAA — routine expenses by other schools in the Pacific West Conference — and it’s clear that the UHH model is not an easy fit in the competitive mold of college athletics.
Here’s something else that doesn’t fit the profile for Hawaii Hilo basketball: the Vulcans will open the season with two of the top five returning rebounders in the conference, a statement no other school in the PWC can make.
Thanks to the decision by BYU-Hawaii to drop intercollegiate athletics — a pattern for BYU-affiliated schools in recent years — UHH coach GE Coleman was able to lure 6-foot-8 senior Denhym Brooke, seventh in rebounding (7.0) per game last year, to the Big Island. He will be teamed with senior Brian Ishola (8.5), fourth in the conference last season. Chance Orr (Hawaii Pacific, 7.6), and Mike Crawley (Fresno Pacific, 7.1), finished fifth and sixth, respectively last year in PWC rebounds, but both completed their college eligibility.
This is a break in the pattern that can only benefit the school after four years in which the Vulcans have been relative punching bags under the boards.
“We continue adding depth as we go,” Coleman said, “ and the biggest need on a consistent basis has been at the defensive end, protecting the rim, rebounding. We just haven’t had that but, especially with Denhym coming in, I think we have improved in all those areas.”
Ishola’s presence last year lifted the Vulcans from the bottom of the conference to the low middle end in rebounding, but he carried an outsized amount of responsibility around the boards. Opponents can double team one rebounder and reduce his effectiveness in the same way double teams can limit the scoring opportunities for shooters.
Sometimes the raw numbers don’t explain the bigger picture, so while UHH improved in rebounding last year thanks mostly to Ishola, it was 13th in opponents’ field goal percentage. The Vulcans allowed opponents an average of .481 from the field, but there were 12 games in a 10-16 season in which opponents shot 50 percent or better. The nadir was a 61 percent effort by Hawaii Pacific when it went 18-for-29.
If a team allows 61 percent field goal shooting over 100 games in the Pac/West, five wins might be optimistic. Something had to change.
Coleman’s efforts to build depth throughout the squad might have found a beneficial tipping point through the recruiting season. Brooke, clearly, is a big help, teaming up with Ishola inside. It’s a little like double teaming wide receivers in football, in that the more attention opponents pay to Ishola, the more opportunities for Brooke.
Rebounding depth and flexibility should be a major plus for the Vulcans in 2017-18, bolstered by the transfer of Devin Johnson, a 6-6 wing with a decorated history in the community college ranks where he was a first team all-conference selection at Lower Columbia and a two-year, first team all-defensive selection.
If Johnson can frustrate opponents on the wing and help inside, the difference should be noticeable.
Another transfer, 6-1 Mike Golden from Ocean County College in New Jersey brings a 40 percent shooting percentage from 3-point range after scoring over 1,000 points in two years of junior college basketball. You don’t expect him to replicate the 24 points per game average of Parker Farris, but maybe 12-16 points per game with others chipping in?
Coleman will add another transfer, Trey Ingram, a 6-1 guard who averaged 10.7 points per game last season at St. Martins, when paperwork is completed, but until then, a pointless NCAA rule doesn’t allow the coach to comment. With two years experience, Ingram will be a certain upgrade in roster depth, at the very least.
Along with some freshman prospects, he might have enough to make a run at a playoff spot.
“We’re used to playing in what I think is, arguably, the best Division II conference in the country,” Coleman said. “It’s tough day in and day out but after four years, after building this thing bit-by-bit as we have gone along, I think finishing in the top six in the Pac/West (qualifying for the postseason tournament), would be something we could all be proud of around here.”
Two years ago, they came within one game of the postseason, then slid back a bit last year. Can freshmen come in and contribute right away?
One who might is 6-4 wing Kylan Mann, a lefty from Southern California who averaged 19.8 points on a 25-5 team and will arrive with the reputation as a scorer, more than just a shooter and that would be a boost for a squad that has arguably had too many one dimensional players. Scoring on rebounds, mid-range shots, from the foul line, with an ability to take the ball to the basket? All of that would be welcomed.
Cleo Cain, a 6-3 wing, was first team all-conference selection in his Los Angeles area high school and Will Burghardt, 5-11, is a guard who scored over 1,000 points at Mark Morris High School in Southwest Washington and finished his senior season averaging 23 points per game.
“Nobody wants to lose a guy like Parker (Farris) and his 24 points a game,” Coleman said. “You’re talking about a school record-holder, a tremendous pure shooter, that’s hard to replace.
“But we seem to have a pretty well-balanced class coming in. I think we can make up the difference in scoring, though I expect that might take a while for our guys to settle in.
“People didn’t get to see what a good shooter (Ryley) Callaghan really is, he spent a lot of the time last year spreading the ball around, getting comfortable, but at the end of the season he started scoring like he can, and Eric Wattree, I feel, will blossom as a scorer this year.”
For a team that has always been looking up at Pac/West opponents, the 2017-18 season might finally be the time it can look straight ahead and see a path to the playoffs.
Even for an extreme outlier, the timing might be right.
