The Fall (And Rise) of the Hawaii Warriors
Published January 05, 2008
Contrary to popular belief, Hawaiian sugar is not always sweet.
On New Years Day, a game that could have changed the face of Hawaii football and athletics in general, instead left the eternally misunderstood, ignored, and disrespected sports program back at square one.
At the Superdome in New Orleans, Louisiana, the Western Athletic Conference champion Hawaii Warriors fell to SEC powerhouse Georgia 41-10, bringing an abrupt, unexpected, and extremely disappointing end to a dream season.
Don't be mistaken. The season was still magical. The overall dream is still alive. But the result of that game gave all the naysayers vindication, something that is never good for long term parity in college sports. The Warriors brought their spirits and bodies to the big dance, but there was something missing and I don't think it was their shoes. As it pertains to Georgia's performance in the game, the word domination does not come to mind, but "control" does. They seemed to have complete control throughout nearly the entire game. It took a few minutes before Hawaii even seemed to be awake. They kind of sleepwalked through the first couple of series. I truly believe they thought they would win this game and that may have been the problem.
At times during their amazing 12-0 campaign in 2007, the Hawaii Warriors football team seemed to sleepwalk through a handful of victories, seemingly toying with certain opponents, allowing them to take momentarily leads late in games just so the legendary quarterback Colt Brennan could show off his one of a kind mojo once more. But when you're playing a team from the SEC and that team has a reasonable gripe as to why they're not playing in the BCS championship game, you sure as heck better be ready to play.
Eventually, the Warriors woke up, but instead of playing like they belonged--as they were implored to do by head coach June Jones before the game--they played much of the game as if they weren't surprised to be getting beat and maybe even like they expected it. Perhaps all the negative talk had finally caught up to the team and some of the players started to believe it, but I'm not buying it. I've seen this team come back from their death beds to win in the most unbelievable ways. I've never seen them lie down like this. My best bet was, as can be explained by some of the lackluster performances, the team was just plain tired. I'm sure the team had themselves ready to play in their minds, but I'd also be extremely naive to believe that they had no fun while in the Big Easy. You can't honestly expect a team who has never made it to the big dance before to hug the walls once they get there.
- The Fall (And Rise) of the Hawaii Warriors
- Published: January 05, 2008
- Type: Opinion
- Section: Sports
- Filed Under: Sports: Football (American)
- Writer: Jonathan Medina
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Comments on this articleComments
Its a long hard road to build a good football program and Georgia has been at it for much longer than Hawaii has even been a state. They had a fantastic season but the schedule that they played did not prepare them for the type of team my Dawgs had that night.
Mark Richt is a fine man and certainly not a jerk. He has never been one to try to humiliate a team once he had the game at hand. You, yourself said that Hawaii had the potential to come back from great deficits even in the 4th quarter. Also, complaining about a team trying to score smacks a little like sour grapes.
They had a hell of a great year . They caught a pissed off "G" team with something to prove . Look at the sooners .... do you think O.U. belongs in the BCS ? That Island team will be back if June stays and with better players ... I am impressed by them .... blow outs just happen .. jmho
Coach Richt is probably the most well respect man in college football, so say what you will about the football team as a whole, but the man is a good and caring individual. UGA had its 2 string in the game in the middle of the third quarter and when Richt was going for it on fourth down in the fourth quarter we had our third string in there. Most of them were seniors and wanted to be as much as a part of the victory as the rest of the team. And last time I checked Hawaii was running the score up on little glorified high school teams this season. Hawaii put up 17 points in the fourth quarter, and still throwing for it on 4th down on Charleston Southern, so don't talk about bush league.
If you wanna talk about "bush" league as you call it, how about your little thug #29 Jones, going helmet to helmet on our senior return man and putting him out of his final game. And all he wanted to do was take his helmet off and talk trash and look hard for the camera.
Hawaii got exactly what it deserved New Years Day....a reality check
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(Or ping: http://blogcritics.org/mt/tb/72592)
I've never been one to crap on a parade, nor am I trying to be a nay-sayer, but this season shows that Hawai'i has come a long way, but still has a lot of the same difficulties: a great record that was at least partly due to a weak conference and weaker non-conference schedule, and a difficulty playing off the island (surely at least in part because they ahve to travel so dang far to play road games, and vice versa in home games).
June has certainly re-established the bar at Hawai'i to the point that I see no reason why the next decade won't be a constant battle between Boise and the Warriors for the WAC title (with an occasional threat from Fresno State). Question is, is that good enough? I think so, but the national media won't.
(Plus, I think, considering what he has accomplished at Hawai'i, June might want the challenge of trying to turn into Howard Schnellenberger Jr and resurrect another college football program down at SMU)