Erickson’s game-winner delivers resilient Hawai’i over UC Irvine

HONOLULU – Everyone needs a Hunter Erickson.

The 6-foot-3 guard from Provo, Utah calmly cashed in on a fallaway jumper from 15 feet away as time expired on Saturday night, electrifying nearly 5,000 fans inside Bankoh Arena at Stan Sheriff Center as the University of Hawai’i men’s basketball team sent rival UC Irvine off with a 67-66 loss in the final meeting in the islands as conference foes.

“Just thank goodness that we’ve got the one,” teammate and longtime friend Isaac Johnson said after Erickson’s late heroics.

Erickson’s buzzer-beating jumper ended off another war between the Anteaters and Rainbow Warriors that saw 22 lead changes and another 15 times tied, helping the hosts snap a four-game losing streak against UCI.

Hawai’i (12-3, 4-1 Big West) moved to 3-0 following a loss on the season, bouncing back after an uncharacteristic showing on the road against UC San Diego to get right back in the mix at the top of the Big West.

Isaac Johnson paced the Rainbow Warriors in the win, scoring all 15 of his points after halftime to help power an offense that shot nearly 52% from the floor following the first half. The graduate center added five rebounds and a pair of blocks for UH, making the most of his 13 minutes of work as he dealt with foul woes for the majority of the evening.

Harry Rouhliadeff powered the hosts in the first half, scoring 11 of his 14 points in the opening 20 minutes. The senior forward also dished the ball off to Erickson in the waning moments, getting the best look at the game-winner of anyone in the house.

“He’s really deadly around that mid-range spot,” Rouhliadeff said while re-running the game’s final moments in his head. “I was right behind him when it went up and it just looked cash.”

Erickson stuffed the box sheet to go along with his first game-winning buzzer beater since high school, tallying seven points, five rebounds, four assists and three blocks in the win despite shooting just 3-of-10 from the field. Despite his shooting woes earlier in the night, the guard said he knew the final shot was good off of his hand.

“Luckily, I was able to get to a spot that, you know, that’s a shot I practiced a lot,” Erickson said of the buzzer-beating pull-up. “Obviously not the go-to shot during the game most of the time, but at the end of the day when teams are playing good defense, that’s a shot you can always get off, no matter what.”

The ending sequence was a microcosm of the night as a whole.

Erickson’s heroics erased a go-ahead layup from Derin Saran from moments prior. The first half watched the teams trade runs throughout, seeing Hawai’i take a 29-27 advantage into the midway break after a 7-2 run by the Anteaters tied the game moments prior.

The first half for the Rainbow Warriors was a gritty, albeit ugly, effort as two starters saw themselves glued to the bench for a large portion of the period. Isaac Johnson picked up a flagrant foul less than two minutes into the contest while getting double teamed, sending him to the bench for the majority of the opening 20 while Dre Bullock followed closely behind needing to be checked out by the medical staff after taking a shot to the head.

The bench filled in admirably in their absence as Yacine Toumi and Isaiah Kerr provided a couple of valuable buckets to give the hosts an early 17-9 lead with 12:38 left to play in the opening half. UC Irvine responded with a 9-0 run over the next three and a half minutes, taking an 18-17 lead with under nine minutes remaining until halftime as Jovan Jester Jr. hit his lone triple of the game.

Erickson drilled a straightaway 3-pointer following the under-8-minute media timeout, giving Hawai’i back a lead they would not fully relinquish for the rest of the half. Harry Rouhliadeff’s first three of the night pushed the lead back out to six for UH, but the Anteaters would pull back within a pair going into the break as the Rainbow Warriors connected on just four of their final 22 attempts from the floor.

The sides continued battle when play resumed, trading the lead 10 times and tying each other another five in the opening 10 minutes of second half action. UCI sophomore guard Jurian Dixon, the 2024-25 Big West Freshman of the Year, tied the game at 48 with 9:24 left in regulation but Isaac Johnson finally scored his first points of the night with a three from the top of the key to put UH back in front.

Once he got on the board, Big Fish didn’t stop as he followed it up with an old-fashioned three-point play and again from the top of the key to power the Rainbow Warriors to a 61-59 lead with 3:34 left to play.

UC Irvine would not relent, pushing back in front by two with 1:59 remaining after a pair of hits from the charity stripe by guard Derin Saran. Johnson knotted the game back up at 63 with a couple of his own free throw makes and put Hawai’i ahead with 1:11 left with a tough left-handed hook shot over a couple of defenders.

A foul on the Big Fish on the other end sent Dixon to the line, but the sophomore guard split the set of free throws, keeping the Rainbow Warriors up a point with under a minute to play.

With a chance to add some breathing room on the other end, Hawai’i instead turned it over on a baseline out-of-bounds play and saw Saran slip in the last of his game-high 22 points for a go-ahead layup with 11 seconds to play.

Hawai’i did not panic, advancing the ball to the frontcourt and calling timeout with a chance to still snatch a victory against the top-of-conference Anteaters.

Enter Hunter Erickson’s heroics.

Erickson took a pass from Harry Rouhliadeff across the lane and elevated from the free throw line, falling away from the outstretched arms of UCI forward Kyle Evans and hoisting as the clock drained to zero.

“Everything was in slow motion,” Rouhliadeff said chuckling about the moments after he passed the ball off. “When it swished, the crowd popped, I was like what the hell is happening?”

Aaron Hunkin-Claytor provided a massive boost at the point guard spot for the Rainbow Warriors, finishing as the third and final player in double digits with 12 points to go with five rebounds, six assists and two steals in 36 minutes of work. The sophomore guard was tied with forward Gytis Nemeikša for a team-high plus-9.

Nemeikša tacked on seven points, five rebounds, three blocks and two steals off the bench for Hawai’i, who spent 24 minutes and 1 second of the game leading.

The final second mattered the most, sending UH fans home happy as Erickson’s jumper swished through to deliver the most important win of the year so far.

“That was a night I don’t think I or many will forget,” a beaming head coach Eran Ganot said after the victory. “That’s what’s great about the game, or life. Every day, you have no idea, you have great belief and faith that great things can happen and then sometimes there’s moments you’ll never forget.”

UC Irvine (12-6, 5-1 Big West) was paced by Saran’s 22 points while Kyle Evans added 13 points, eight rebounds and four blocks in the loss by the Anteaters. UCI committed 15 turnovers in a game for just the fourth time this season and shot under 39% as a team.

Hawai’i returns to action next Thursday, hitting the road to take on Cal Poly before visiting UC Santa Barbara two days after. The Mustangs have split all three weeks of conference play so far, most recently falling at CSUN before returning home and defeating UC Davis.