Day after Hawaii

Got my daughter’s car running (strange how the battery dies when the dome light is left on overnight in 20-degree weather), watched most of the replay and ready to go with the day-after post following GU’s 73-54 win over Hawaii in Robert Sacre’s homecoming in Vancouver.

Here are the links: Gamers from S-R , A.P. , Star-Advertiser , Vancouver Sun and The Province .

Read on.

—We’ll start with Sacre, who had another solid night (16 points, 10 rebounds). To demonstrate his effectiveness thus far, that was probably his third best game of the season. The big man didn’t score until midway through the first half on a nice feed from Gary Bell Jr.

He finished 4 of 6 from the field (one make a nifty left-handed hook) and 8 of 10 at the line. A missed free throw with 7 minutes left ended his streak of consecutive free throws at 19. He’d made 27 of his previous 28 at that point.

Sacre enjoyed his trip home, but said he tried to treat it like any other game. He used to watch the Vancouver Grizzlies play at Rogers Arena when he was a youngster.

“I saw Blue Edwards in the crowd and the first thing I did was go to (David) Stockton and say, ‘Oh my God, he played with your dad,’ ” Sacre said. “It was cool. It was awesome to be on the Grizzlies court. Vancouver needs basketball in this city.”

The last time he played in Rogers Arena was two years ago for the Canadian National team in a victory over China.

—Hawaii is an accomplished defensive team under coach Gib Arnold. The Rainbow Warriors were eighth nationally last season in field-goal percentage and they limited GU to 40-percent shooting.

They applied strong on-ball pressure on the perimeter and clearly emphasized a couple of points on their scouting report. They pretty much left Mike Hart alone on the perimeter, sometimes playing 6-8 feet away when he caught the ball. Hart missed an early 3, his only shot of the game. On the next possession, Hart declined to take an open 14-footer and not long after Few summoned Mathis Mönninghoff, who quickly missed a 3-pointer. Much of the game, Gonzaga went with three smaller guards from the combination of the 6-1 Kevin Pangos, 6-1 Bell Jr., 6-4 Marquise Carter and 5-11 Stockton. Hart played 5 minutes and didn’t start in the second half (Bell Jr. was in his place); Mönninghoff played 10 minutes.

As Arnold said afterward, his defenders tried to zero in on Pangos, who didn’t have much room to operate but still managed to make a pair of 3s and score 12 points. Hawaii also played off Carter early (though nowhere near as far as with Hart). They went under screens and sagged off him when he was just one pass away in the offense, probably because Carter was just 3 of 15 from the floor entering the game. Carter missed a couple of early attempts before generating five quick points at the outset of the second half. He finished with 10 points on 4-of-8 shooting.

Hawaiicamped in the lane on Sacre, even on the rare occasion he caught a pass 15-18 feet from the hoop. Sacre missed an open elbow jumper early. We’ll see if future opponents do the same because Sacre has proven to be a pretty good shooter from that area of the court (see FT line).

“Their guards are a little quicker than I thought watching on tape,” Arnold said. “Pangos is the guy that we marked and I still think he hit three (actually two) 3s. He’s as good a shooter as I’ve seen in a long time.”

—Arnold, who picked up technical fouls in each half and was tossed, was less than thrilled with the officiating.

Hawaiiwas whistled for 27 fouls to GU’s 11. GU was 18 of 28 at the line, Hawaii 7 of 8. Two Rainbow Warriors fouled out.

Arnoldwas run after protesting Bell Jr.’s steal on the wing from Zane Johnson as he attempted to drive.

“I felt that he was hit pretty hard and I wanted to protect my shooter and I told them so,” Arnold said. “I like a physical game, I like that. You can read the stat sheet and get your own conclusion from the stat sheet.”

Arnoldsaid he was ‘shocked’ that Sacre could play an entire game without a foul, but “you know, that’s how it was called tonight.”

He seemed to break out heavy sarcasm a couple times with these lines: “We didn’t do a great job of guarding the free-throw line. It seemed like they were open at the free-throw line a lot tonight.” And of his technical fouls: “The two best calls of the game. The guys got that right.”

Arnold acknowledged that his team “got a little tired at the end when they were able to get those deep low-post catches, but we held them in the 30s (shooting percentage) in the first half and 40 for the game. We pride ourselves on keeping teams in the 30s.”

—The Zags did a solid job on Hawaii’s three top offensive weapons (Johnson, Trevor Wiseman and Shaquille Stokes). Wiseman, who had 19 points and 16 rebounds in UH’s season opening win over Cal State Northridge, finished with three points, six rebounds, four turnovers and four fouls. Johnson, who had 24 points in the opener, scored 12 points on 4-of-12 shooting (4 of 8 on 3s) with three turnovers. Stokes made 6 of 17 shots and scored 17 points to go with one assist and six turnovers.

—Next up is Western Michigan in the annual Ronald McDonald House Charities Classic at the Arena on Saturday. The Broncos won a couple of exhibition games but have dropped four straight to open the season, including an 81-76 setback to Colorado earlier today in Puerto Rico.

Tickets are still available for Saturday’s 1 p.m. contest at all TicketsWest locations and at ticketswest.com.

STATS OF NOTE

—In three games, Gonzaga is 84 of 116 at the foul line while opponents are 32 of 40 (Sacre is 35 of 41 alone). GU has committed 41 fouls to opponents’ 87.

—Pangos, 12 of 12 at the stripe entering the game, was 4 of 6. Elias Harris, 5 of 10 at the line entering, was 0 of 3.

—Stockton, scoreless in 26 minutes in GU’s first two games, had six points, made his only 3-point attempt and handed out three assists in 24 minutes.

—Gonzaga had just 11 turnovers against Hawaii’s defense, six of those by bigs (Dower, Sacre, Harris and Spangler).

—Hawaii finished with 23 turnovers.

—Mathis Keita saw his first action of the season when he entered in the final minute.

—The Zags lost the boards for the first time (40-36), but still collected 16 offensive rebounds to give them 52 in three games.

—Sacre had just four double-doubles prior to this season. He now has three in three outings. Harris has one this season, 10 for his career.

—Bell Jr., after struggling in his first collegiate game against EWU, has made six 3s while scoring 14 points in each of Gonzaga’s last two games.

—Despite shooting 37.3, 41.1 and 40.0 on FGs, Gonzaga has scored 38, 39, 41, 48, 33 and 40 points in six halves.

QUOTEBOOK:

Arnold: “The difference in the game was the turnovers and they won the turnover battle and the free-throw battle. I thought we matched them pretty well on both ends in half-court offense and half-court defense.”

Arnold: “Eight minutes to go we were down one with the ball and right there. We were right there and we kind of lost it down at the end. I was pleased with the effort, pleased with how they held the scout and did what we asked. For 32 minutes we played pretty good ball.”