Slow starts have continued dooming Hawai’i football

HONOLULU – The red light is flashing.

The alarm bells have not hit full blast and there might be many weekends remaining in the 2026 college football season, but an unexpected 1-3 start by the University of Hawai’i football team has put everyone on high-alert entering Week 5.

Hawai’i has had their fair share of bad calls and bad breaks already through just over a month of the campaign. A catch at the Farm that continues to confound, an Audric Harris touchdown snag snatched off the board after review and multiple punchout fumble recoveries called back as “incomplete passes” are just a few of the 50/50 plays that have gone against the Rainbow Warriors’ favor.

But there also has been an uncharacteristic anemic offense, brain farts on special teams and the defense running out of gas in untimely moments. Outside of the fourth quarter against Stanford and a first-half masterclass from DeVon Rice against New Mexico State, you can make the case that the offense hasn’t shown up at all this season.

Part of that falls on the departures from last year’s team, from Jackson Harris (LSU) and Brandon White (Kansas State) hitting the transfer portal to Nick Cenacle’s graduation to Pofele Ashlock’s lingering offseason injury taking away four of the best receivers previously on the roster.

Another part falls on the team not playing with enough urgency, failing to get out of the mud before they fall behind in a game and forcing the defense to get stop after stop when it’s in the middle of replacing plenty of starting pieces itself.

Hawai’i has spent 51 minutes and 37 seconds with a lead across four games this season. More than 49 of those minutes came in the team’s lone victory over New Mexico State while the other two minutes and 25 seconds with an advantage came in the fourth quarter of the opener at Stanford. The Rainbow Warriors have not held a lead in either conference game they’ve played.

The defense is not blameless, either. They’ve forced two turnovers in four games, and they both came against NMSU. They couldn’t get the stop needed after the offense magically clicked in the fourth quarter at Stanford. Wyoming’s offense (which struggled mightily in three games prior) posted season highs across the board and flat out was the more physical unit in Laramie this past weekend.

And of course, special teams has had another fair catch kickoff miscue, multiple shanked point-after attempts and the infamous “double No. 8” disaster from Wyoming weekend. The unit has also only seen one explosive return (which the offense failed to capitalize on against New Mexico State after a scrambling Alejado got lit up, fumbled and saw it returned for a touchdown the other way) across four games of opportunities.

The point? Cohesive football wins games. Forcing the defense to play from behind over 61% of the time is not setting them up for success and makes it more difficult to rush the passer and stop the run.

The offense becomes more predictable when trailing as well, forcing the team to look to the passing attack even more often than it already did. It also doesn’t help when starting field position comes inside UH’s own 30-yard line, which it has on 30 of the team’s 45 offensive possessions this year.

To be fair, the Hawai’i special teams unit has pushed other teams inside their own 30-yard line on 32 of the 45 opposing possessions that the Rainbow Warriors have faced. It’s just that other teams have scored touchdowns on six of those other 13 chances and kicked a field goal on another.

Hawai’i’s offense has scored on six of their 15 drives that started from their own 30 or beyond, but only four of those have been touchdowns and two came in the same game against New Mexico State.

That gets us back to the concept of cohesive football.

The one game that Hawai’i won? They dominated the field position battle, led for the majority of the game and forced multiple turnovers.

In the three losses? Surrendered better field position constantly, squandered more quality chances and couldn’t find a way to win the turnover battle.

It’s not as simple as “bad offensive play calling” or “special teams errors” or “the defense can’t get the big stop or make the big play” for Hawai’i.

It’s been ALL of those things.

The good news for the Rainbow Warriors is that plenty of season remains. If stories were written using only the first month of seasons, we would’ve never gotten the magical runs of the 2019 Washington Nationals, the 2007 New York Giants or 2001 Patriots, among many other great comeback stories.

It’s not to say that a Mountain West championship is still within reach or that this first month hasn’t been disappointing. Fans have every right to be upset with the results through four games for Hawai’i.

But 2026 doesn’t have to be a disaster season for the Rainbow Warriors.

They’ll get a shot to right the ship on Saturday night in the islands as old friend Luke Weaver comes to town with the San Jose State Spartans. Former Rainbow Warriors Ken Niumatololo and Craig Stutzmann will also be on the opposing sideline with hopes to hamper Hawai’i’s season even further.

But SJSU comes in at 2-2 and haven’t gotten a taste of conference play yet. It’s notoriously difficult to play as the road team in Hawai’i and the Spartans are coming off a bye week where they had to chew on a 26-10 home loss to Fresno State where Weaver tossed four interceptions for an extra weekend.

San Jose State has owned the rivalry lately, winning the past five meetings against the Rainbow Warriors to keep possession of the Dick Tomey Legacy Trophy. Last year, the Spartans more-or-less killed the hopes at a conference championship appearance for Hawai’i.

If there isn’t motivation and reason to start quick this weekend, then it’s a full five-alarm fire for Hawai’i’s hopes of making a bowl game. A road date at Arizona State awaits after this week, then Mountain West favorite New Mexico comes to town before UH takes the long flight to Illinois to take on NIU on the final leg of a five-game stretch without a bye.

But that’s down the road.

Football is focusing on the here and now. If Hawai’i can handle business on Saturday and swing Timmy Chang’s first win against San Jose State, it’ll make it easier for fans to find more positives for a team that slushed through a slow start at the schedule’s beginning part.

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