After winning the 2026 Credit Union 1 Big West Championship title over UC Irvine on Saturday night, the University of Hawai’i men’s basketball team comfortably watched and waited to hear its name called on Selection Sunday.
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Much like the program’s emergence a decade earlier, the Rainbow Warriors received a spot in the 13-seed line for the 2026 edition of the NCAA Tournament. Unlike the 2016 race, UH will have to navigate the West Region quadrant this time around when they take on fourth-seeded Arkansas (26-8) on Thursday, March 19 at the Moda Center in Portland, Oregon.
“It’s been my dream since I was a little kid,” Hawaii senior forward Harry Rouhliadeff said of watching the Rainbow Warriors reveal themselves in the box. “It was really surreal… Seeing Hawai’i up there, I felt really proud and really proud of our team too.” Hawai’i defeated UC Irvine in the final conference showdown between the bitter rivals in Henderson, earning the Big West’s automatic bid to the fifth NCAA Tournament appearance in program history.
The Razorbacks won the SEC Tournament earlier on Sunday, defeating Vanderbilt by 11 for the program’s first conference tournament championship since 2000. Star freshman G Darius Acuff Jr. earned tournament MVP honors after recording a double-double of 30 points and 11 assists in the title game for Arkansas. “We’re playing a really good program, a program and a staff that we have a lot of respect for and a quick turnaround,” Hawai’i head coach Eran Ganot said immediately after the group was revealed.
Much like UH’s 2016 matchup against Jaylen Brown and the Cal Bears, Arkansas has future NBA talent and plenty of size and skill. The Razorbacks have four different double-digit scorers, led by Acuff Jr.’s 22.7 points per night. The freshman has scored 10-plus points in every contest for the SEC tournament champions and scored 30 or more in five different games in his only collegiate season. The SEC tournament champions will surely test a Rainbow Warrior defense that has ranked among the best in the nation during the 2025-26 campaign.
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Hawai’i has KenPom’s 43rd national defensive rating and will face an Arkansas unit that finished with KenPom’s sixth-best national offensive rating. It will be critical for UH to slow down that dynamic Razorbacks attack, one that has racked up 27 of Evan Miyakawa’s “kill shots” (runs of 10-0 or better) to help pull away from opponents this season.
Of Arkansas’ 26 wins, 11 have come by a margin of 15 or more. Hawai’i has done well in limiting opponents from hitting them with a “kill shot,” according to Miyakawa, allowing eight total runs of 10 or more points to opposing offenses this season. It’s tied for the 25th best mark in the country and one better than the Razorbacks.
Regardless of the outcome of Thursday’s first round in Portland, the Rainbow Warriors have reached the national tournament for the second time in Eran Ganot’s 11 years and the first time since the rest of the staff and players arrived on the islands.
“To come back to this moment 10 years later, having been with the program since 2016 as a player and then as a coach, means a lot to me,” assistant coach Gibson Johnson said of the long rise to being the best in the Big West. “Holding my kids in my arms and telling my 5-year-old son that we are champions made me cry. It means a lot to me and I know it means a lot to the community.”
They would be wise to simply follow their captain’s example. “It might be my last dance in college sports,” Rouhliadeff said. “I’m just going to go out and play my best basketball.”