HONOLULU — While Hawaii Pacific University’s long-term future at the Shark Tank is in question, the Sharks proved Thursday night that they can still put on a show at their spirited home gym — and to a statewide audience to boot.
HPU’s first televised game on Spectrum Sports was a grand affair for the Sharks as they throttled Hawaii Hilo, 88-71 in the PacWest Conference opener for both teams.
Second-year coach Jesse Nakanishi exulted in the on-court win, a rebounding and passing clinic, to go with a less tangible but nonetheless important victory in the form of some rare exposure on the airwaves for the Division II program. It was the first TV game at the Shark Tank, the former gym of St. Francis School.
[Note: See below for more photos of HPU-Hawaii Hilo men's basketball.]
“This is kind of two years in the making,” Nakanishi told Spectrum News. “I’m really thankful to (Spectrum Networks Senior Director) Dan Schmidt for giving us the window and block of time to do this.”
The University of Hawaii’s usual Spectrum Sports play-by-play man, Kanoa Leahey, was on hand to call the game on a night when UH teams were either off or out of town. Nakanishi lauded the production company Da Crew for its efforts.
“It just went seamless. They really went to bat for us,” Nakanishi said. “The biggest thing was just trying to showcase not just our program but the whole school and all the great things we have going on, and we were able to do that with commercials and halftime and postgame show.”
Senior guard Sherman Brashear poured in a game-high 25 points on 7-for-14 shooting (5-for-10 from 3) as the Sharks spread the wealth — they assisted on 25 of their 32 made field goals — and crushed the Vulcans on the glass, 39-14.
Brashear, a transfer from Division I Texas-Rio Grande Valley, notched his fifth 20-point game of the season (sixth, including a four-point exhibition loss to UH on Nov. 26). He has lived up to the caliber of shooter Nakanishi had hoped he would get after he converted 40% of his 3s at UTRGV.
Brashear credited Nakanishi for the team culture he’s established.
“Coming to work with these guys every day, it’s always a smile on their face no matter what’s going on,” Brashear said. “If we keep building on this, we can do something really special here.”
Sharks forward Pavle Kuzmanovic hit four of seven 3-point attempts and finished with 16 points, center Jonas Visser had 12 points and 10 rebounds and Charlie Weber scored 13 points in 17 minutes off the bench.
Nakanishi wanted his team to limit the Vulcans (4-4, 0-1 PacWest), a prolific offensive rebounding team behind big man Nadjrick Peat, to four O-boards per half.
“We ended up holding them to four the whole game, and got 15 ourselves, and scored 21 points off of that,” Nakanishi said. “That was the difference-maker, and on top of that, we shot the ball well (55.2%).
Peat led the Vulcans with 14 points, seven rebounds and two blocked shots. He had some highlight plays, but HPU (5-3, 1-0) made the extra pass consistently and put up 53 points on 64.3% shooting in the first half, after which it led by 15.
Hilo coach Kaniela Aiona called his team a work in progress and credited HPU for a high level of execution.
“They passed the ball really well, they ran their stuff,” Aiona said. “They definitely deserved to win that one.
“Not the way we wanted to start, obviously. It’s one of those games where we didn’t make good luck for ourselves and they capitalized on our mistakes.”
The St. Francis School grounds were sold to the Avalon Group for $23.5 million in early 2024. The developer plans a housing complex on the site, but Manoa residents have protested.
For the immediate term, HPU will look to build on progress like Thursday night with a packed house of several hundred students/supporters and an audience beyond.
Brashear said, “I’d say thank you to HPU fans and everybody around the community coming out supporting us. Appreciate Spectrum coming out to broadcast it. I think maybe y’all come out some more.”
Nakanishi was hopeful.
“I’m a dreamer a little bit, but you know, just taking it step by step,” he said. “We were like, ‘let’s just get one done and see how it goes, and show our brand, and maybe we can parlay that good experience into two or three next year.’ You never know who might want to pick us up. … Hopefully it can be a more regular thing.”
Brian McInnis covers the state’s sports scene for Spectrum News Hawaii. He can be reached at brian.mcinnis@charter.com.