The University of Hawaii football team was edged 29-27 by UNLV on Saturday night at the Clarence T.C. Ching Athletics Complex, falling to 4-6 for the 2024 season and 2-3 in Mountain West Conference games.
UNLV, meanwhile, took home the Golden Pineapple Trophy and improved to 7-2 overall and 3-1 in Mountain West games, staying alive in the conference race.
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Following its dramatic win over Fresno State, the Rainbow Warriors could not come up with more late heroics as the Rebels played keep away in the final minutes.
In the second play of the game, a Brayden Schager pass went off of Nick Cencale’s arms and was intercepted by Johnathan Baldwin, leading to a Caden Chittenden field goal for UNLV from 41 yards with 13:02 left in the first quarter.
Hawaii got on the scoreboard with a 74-yard pass from Schager to Nick Cencale, the longest pass play of the year for the Rainbow Warriors.
UNLV got on the board again with a safety on a blocked Lucas Borrow punt that trickled out of the UH end zone, giving the Rebels a 12-7 lead through the first quarter.
The lone score of the second quarter came on Kansei Matsuzawa’s career-long 41-yard field goal. UNLV true freshman Caden Chittenden missed two field goals in the second quarter, including a potential 30-yarder with two seconds left in the first half.
After Chittenden made a field goal on UNLV’s first possession of the third quarter, Hawaii took its first lead of the game on a 49-yard pass from Schager to Panoke with 8:38 remaining in the third quarter. That lead was short-lived, as UNLV drove 71 yards in four plays, ending with a Hajj-Malik Williams pass to Ricky White III for 37-yard touchdown to take a 22-17 lead with 6:53 left in the third quarter.
After another Matsuzawa field goal, the Rainbow Warriors and Rebels exchanged touchdowns, with Panoke’s second touchdown of the day closing out the scoring with 4:19 left. UNLV returned the ensuing kickoff and bled the remainder of the clock, never allowing Hawaii to get the ball back.
Schager completed 14 of his 35 passes for 282 yards, three touchdowns and an interception, while Panoke had the first multi-touchdown game of his collegiate career.
Defensively, Tariq Jones had a game-high 10 tackles with half a tackle for loss and a pass breakup, while Elijah Robinson added eight tackles, including 1.5 sacks.
For UNLV, star linebacker Jackson Woodard had a team-high eight tackles with 2.5 tackles for loss and half a sack.
The Rebels ran for 290 yards as a team, with Williams and Jai’Den Thomas combining for 231 of them.
Next up for Hawaii is a contest at Utah State on Nov. 16. Kickoff is set for 10 a.m. HST.