This Week in Vulcan Men's Basketball
Record: 2-0 (2-0 PWC)

Vulcans Head to Oahu for Two with Silverswords
Saturday, Jan. 30 vs. Chaminade (0-0), 5 pm, McCabe Gymnasium
Sunday, Jan. 31 vs. Chaminade, 3 pm, McCabe Gymnasium

After Two Weeks Off, Vulcans Get Two Against Strong Silverswords: Two weeks after opening the 2021 season with a pair of wins over Hawaii Pacific, the Vulcans will play their first Pacific West Conference road games of the year at Chaminade, with a Saturday (5 pm) and Sunday (3 pm) twinbill.

Vulcans on Video: No fans are allowed inside McCabe Gymnasium, but you can watch the live stream video. Go to https://hiloathletics.com/sports/mens-basketball/schedule for the link.

Two Weeks of Being Undefeated: UH Hilo began the season 2-0 with a pair of hard fought wins over Hawaii Pacific on Jan. 16-17. Both games had a similarity to them, with the Vulcans opening up big leads, only to see the Sharks come roaring back to to make things very interesting in the end. The Vulcans won their opener 79-71 behind freshman Aniwaniwa Tait-Jones' 21 points and nine rebounds, with Sasa Vuksanovic contributing a double-double with 19 points and 12 rebounds. Darren Williams led all scorers with 23 points. On Sunday, Tait-Jones pace five Vulcans in double figures with 20 points and 11 rebounds, while Jordan Graves added 13 counters and eight assists.

Small Sample Size, But....:The last time the Vulcans began PacWest play at 2-0 was in the 2017-18 season when they opened with wins at home over Concordia and Biola. The last time a Vulcan team started the year 2-0? In 2004-05 when UHH began 4-0, and the Jeff Law-coached team would go on to finish 25-4 and advance to the semifinals of the NCAA Division II west region championships.

Words from the Weekend: In addition to the big numbers posted above, the Vulcans also received a breakout game from guard Steven Hubbell. The senior guard came off the bench to drop in a career-best 11 points and seven rebounds in Sunday's game...In Saturday's win, freshman Ethan Jetter was a perfect 3-for-3 from three-point range and 2-for-2 from the free throw line for 11 points...Jalen Thompson also had 11 points on Sunday, hitting 3-of-6 shots from three-point land...Darren Williams, who had 23 points on Saturday, had all-around numbers on Sunday of nine points, five rebounds and five assists. 

New Era: A new era began well for Vulcan basketball and Big Island native Kaniela Aiona. The former Menlo leader is just the sixth head coach in the history of the UH Hilo program. Aiona led Menlo to a 19-11 record last winter and a berth in the NAIA national tournament before COVID-19 ended their season. The Honoka`a native turned the Oaks program around, taking a team that was 3-23 upon his arrival and improving to 20-11 in just three seasons. In five seasons and two games, Aiona is now 74-71 as a head coach. Aiona brings lead assistant Jamison Montgomery with him and also hired Humboldt State Hall of Fame coach Steve Kinder.

Vulcans a Mix of Veterans and Newcomers: All the players are new to Coach Aiona, but six players are familiar with wearing the Vulcan uniform. UH Hilo returns senior veterans Jordan Graves and Sasa Vuksanovic, both of whom have significant starting experience. Graves played in just eight games last year before an injury halted his season, but he was averaging 13.3 points a game. As a junior, he ranked second in the PacWest in steals. Vuksanovic, a 6-10 versatile post, led UHH in assists last year and also added 13.6 points and 6.2 boards a game. Other returnees include sharpshooting Jalen Thompson, Tom Power (6-8), Greg Walter (6-6), guards Steven Hubbell and Anthony Haskett, along with redshirt Payton Grant. Newcomers include 5-8 guard Darren Williams, who was the MVP of the Inland Empire Athletic Conference last year, averaging 17 points and six assists a game for Chaffey College. 6-8 Jabari Sweet averaged 13 points and seven boards at Chabot College, while 6-6 freshman Aniwaniwa Tait-Jones showed early promised with 18 points against the University of Hawaii. 6-5 fellow freshman Ethan Jetter will help, as will two-time BIIF Player of the Year Kia`i Apele (Waiakea HS).
 
Coach Aiona on Opening Wins Against the Sharks: "I thought we showed character in how we competed in our first two games. Now we are looking for growth each time we step on the floor." 
 
Pandemic Puzzle: The Vulcans (UH Hilo), Sharks (Hawaii Pacific) and Silverswords (Chaminade) will see a lot of each other this winter. The Pacific West Conference is playing pod-only schedules during the regular season, meaning that the Hawai`i teams will square off a total of 12 times each against each other---same for the schools in the northern California and the southern California portion of the conference. Teams will also play each other on back-to-back days in the same gym, to cut down on travel and exposure. Postseason play is still a possibility, COVID-19 permitting. But no teams in the CCAA are playing basketball this winter, and only three in the GNAC are competing (Seattle Pacific, Saint Martin's and Northwest Nazarene). The GNAC schools are also playing a number of non-conference games against local NAIA and Division III teams.

Coach Aiona on Having Two Weeks to Prepare for Silverswords: "We are excited to get back on the court. We have had a great two weeks of class, practice and rest." 

Chaminade Clippings: These two games at the end of January will be the season openers for Chaminade, who had their scheduled games last week against Hawaii Pacific postponed. Even without playing yet, the Silverswords have enough respect around the region to rank fourth in the D2SIDA West Region poll. Chaminade will be looking to replace 78 percent of its scoring from a year ago, including 6-6 Tyler Cartaino, who provided 20.8 points a contest. The Silverswords do return the 2019-20 PacWest Freshman of the Year, Isaac Amaral-Artharee who averaged 9.4 points a contest. They also recruited well with a class that includes the 2017 Hawaii Prep Player of the Year in Jessiya Villa, who transferred from Univ. of Hawaii.

Series Snapshot: The Silverswords have won the last four games in the series against the Vulcans, and Chaminade leads the all-time series, 68-44.
 
Coach Aiona on Chaminade: "We don't have game film on Chaminade since this is their opening game, but we know they are a well run program and they have a lot of depth at the guard position. In the past they liked to pressure and play fast so we have worked on going against that style this week. Games like this are fun because they take you back to when scouting opponents wasn't as important and all you could do was just focus on doing what you do. We are expecting two very competitive contests this weekend."
 
Around the Loop: While HPU and Chaminade will have to reschedule, the PacWest pods in NorCal and SoCal got their seasons underway. Point Loma took two games from Concordia, while Fresno Pacific-Dominican split, as did Azusa Pacific-Biola. The Sea Lions are the region's top team at 3-0, with Northwest Nazarene at No. 2 with a 6-1 record (their lone loss was by 30 points to Point Loma). Azusa Pacific is No. 3 (1-1), Chaminade No. 4 (0-0), Seattle Pacific is No. 5 (2-2) and the Vulcans are No. 6 (2-0). 

Last Year: The Vulcans finished 12-14 overall and 10-12 in the Pacific West Conference, good for a tie for sixth place—but for the second year in a row just missed out on a PacWest tournament berth. It was the final season for head coach GE Coleman, whose team upset Azusa Pacific and Concordia early in the season but also dropped three of its final four games.

The Coach: New head coach Kaniela Aiona spent the past five seasons at Menlo in Atherton, Calif, a member of the NAIA Golden State Athletic Conference. The Oaks were 52-34 over the past three seasons and 72-71 overall during Aiona's years. Prior to that he was an assistant coach at St. Leo (Fla.), Benedictine (Ill.), Lake Forest (Ill.), Central Methodist (Mo.) and Webster (Mo.). He played collegiately at Webster. He grew up in Honoka`a and used to go to the Vulcan Basketball camp as a child.