Tom Beattie helped knock his former team down a peg.
The ex-Hawaii guard’s well-rounded game for UC San Diego — 12 points, eight assists and seven rebounds without a turnover — was representative of the night for the defending Big West champion Tritons as UCSD soundly dealt UH its first conference loss, 83-73, on La Jolla, Calif., on Saturday night.
UH, coming off a record-setting 43-point win at UC Riverside on Thursday, found the going much tougher two nights later against the defending champion Tritons (12-3, 2-1 BWC).
The Rainbow Warriors (11-3, 3-1 BWC) had their seven-game winning streak snapped; eight would’ve matched the program’s best under 11th-year coach Eran Ganot.
UCSD, led by Clint Allard, a longtime Tritons assistant in his first year as head coach, had five players score in double figures. Guard Alex Chaikin led the way with 21 points on seven field-goal attempts and forward Bol Dengit was a presence inside with 19 points on 8-for-12 shooting.
Beattie, a UH co-captain as a sophomore before entering the transfer portal after last season, displayed his comfort with his new teammates in a free-flowing system with six assists in the first half — more than his full-game total for any game in his two-year UH career.
The New Zealander added two steals and a blocked shot.
Forward Harry Rouhliadeff led UH with 16 points, wing Dre Bullock added 15 and backup point guard Isaiah Kerr scored 13.
UH hit a season-best 13 3-pointers at UCR but could not replicate the effort from long range, going 7-for-23 (30.4%).
Meanwhile, UC Irvine won by 22 at Cal State Fullerton and moved into sole possession of first place as the last unbeaten Big West team at 4-0. UH hosts UCI on Saturday in another tester early in the conference season.
UCSD, coming off its banner 30-win season that included its first trip to the Division I NCAA Tournament, improved to 32-5 at LionTree Arena since the start of the 2023-24 season. Last year, that’s where the Tritons dealt UH one of the most lopsided losses (39 points) in program history.
The Tritons lost Big West Player of the Year Aniwaniwa Tait-Jones but remained potent with a balanced roster and some portal pickups like Beattie.
The teams played evenly until late in the first half. UH center Isaac Johnson blew past a defender and went up for an emphatic tomahawk flush, but the ball caught on the side of the rim and Johnson went down holding his lower back, and left the game.
UCSD seized the opportunity to go on a 10-0 run to close the half for a 36-29 lead at intermission. The hosts kept it going with seven more points to start the second half despite Johnson’s return to start the period.
UH was unable to mount a sustained rally from its double-digit deficit. Tritons guard Emanuel Prospere II sank a circus shot falling out of bounds, plus the foul, to make it a 16-point game with 4:28 left.
Tritons freshman big man Dimitrije Vukicevic, who came in averaging a point a game, had an outsized impact as he fouled out with a season-high 10 points.
Backup UH center Yacine Toumi missed his second straight game with an ankle issue.
Brian McInnis covers the state’s sports scene for Spectrum News Hawaii. He can be reached at brian.mcinnis@charter.com.