Hawaii Warrior World

Formerly about Rainbow Warriors basketball, but now covering all University of Hawaii sports.

About the blog host

Brian McInnis has covered sports on Oahu full time since 2007, when he joined the Honolulu Star-Bulletin staff as a general reporter. He was the UH basketball beat writer from the 2008-09 season through 2017-18. Follow him on twitter @Brian_McInnis

Latest news

Hawaii women’s tennis: Petra Melounova advances to NCAA round of 32 (VIDEO)

By Brian McInnis on May 19, 2019

UPDATE: Petra Melounova is advancing in the NCAA singles tournament for the second time in her career — and first since her freshman season two years ago — with a 3-6, 6-3, 7-5 comeback win over LSU’s Jessica Golovin in Orlando, Fla. There was an upset in the bracket right next to Melounova; Michigan’s Chiara Lommer knocked off No. 4 seed Ingrid Gamarra Martins of South Carolina. Melounova, ranked No. 61, gets the 47th-ranked Lommer in the second round Tuesday. The match […]

Hawaii baseball: Rainbow Warriors clinch losing season with loss to No. 6 UC Santa Barbara

By Brian McInnis on May 18, 2019

With an emphatic 11-1 loss to No. 6 UC Santa Barbara on Saturday night, the Hawaii baseball team clinched a losing 2019 campaign. UH, which hung around .500 both overall and in Big West play for most of the season, dropped to 20-26 (8-12 BWC) for 2019 after allowing a season-high 18 hits and earning just three hits of their own in front of a Saturday night turnstile crowd of 2,261. It snapped two straight years of winning overall records […]

Hawaii men’s basketball: Concerning recruiting

By Brian McInnis on May 18, 2019

Any takers out there? About two months ago, I wrote about how this spring is a critical juncture for the direction of the Hawaii men’s basketball program as it pertains to recruiting. Would the Rainbow Warriors receive a talent infusion commensurate with their peers in the Big West — the Irvines, Long Beaches, and Santa Barbaras — to break a spell of so-so regular-season performances and one-and-done outings in the conference tournament the last three years? Well, in the weeks since, […]

Hawaii baseball: Big challenge ahead for final home weekend

By Brian McInnis on May 17, 2019

The Hawaii baseball team is out of the Big West title race, but it can muck things up for the team that is currently in the driver’s seat. UH (20-24, 8-10 BWC) is seven games behind No. 6 UC Santa Barbara (41-7, 15-3) with six games to play in a conference that awards its automatic NCAA tournament berth to the regular-season champion. Cal Poly (13-5) and UC Irvine (12-6) are the teams hoping Hawaii can end the red-hot Gauchos’ 10-game […]

Hawaii women’s basketball: Sarah Toeaina is British MVP in first pro season

By Brian McInnis on May 16, 2019

The professional career of former Hawaii women’s basketball star Sarah Toeaina is off to a rousing start. Toeaina, of the Westfield Health Sheffield Hatters in the Women’s British Basketball League (WBBL), was named league MVP today after putting up some huge numbers. She averaged 20 points and 9.7 rebounds in the 2018-19 season for the Hatters, who were just knocked out in the league semifinals. Presenting your 2018-19 @MoltenSports Season MVP Congratulations @_SarahToe of @Hatters_BC 🎉🏀🎉 Her reaction: ⬇️https://t.co/DX4lZ76P56#BritishBasketball #LetsGoHatters […]

Hawaii softball: 8 Rainbow Wahine pick up Big West postseason awards

By Brian McInnis on May 14, 2019

The 2019 postseason awards haul was respectable for a Hawaii softball team that put together its best season in six years. Per UH, it was the most Rainbow Wahine players honored in total since 2013, which was the same year UH rejoined the Big West in softball. First baseman/catcher Callee Heen, third baseman Nicole Lopez and pitcher Brittany Hitchcock were named to the All-Big West first team. Catcher Heather Cameron was named to the second team, and Cheeks Ramos (utility) […]

Hawaii softball: 7 seniors get a surprise in final game

By Brian McInnis on May 11, 2019

Bob Coolen figured the time for some lineup trickery was at hand. In his 28 years as Hawaii softball coach, only a handful of times has he had as large a senior class as the seven of 2019. And in those past instances, there’d typically be some kind of conference positioning or overall win-loss consideration that superseded a luxury such as starting every member of a large crop of seniors on senior night. Not this year. This time, UH knew […]

Hawaii water polo: Misfortune strikes UH; Cal downs Rainbow Wahine in NCAA quarterfinals

By Brian McInnis on May 10, 2019

UPDATE: Hawaii got off to a strong start and led California by two goals, and UH was tied with the Golden Bears at halftime, but the Pac-12 school dominated the second half to swim away with a 17-13 quarterfinal win over UH at Stanford on Friday afternoon. The fourth-seeded Golden Bears, who improved to 3-1 against Hawaii this season — 3-0 on the mainland — rattled off five straight goals spanning the third and fourth quarters once UH got within […]

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