It was a game created with the University of Hawai‘i football team in mind.
In 2001, Hawai‘i went 9-3, ending its regular season with a resounding 72-45 victory over BYU at a sold-out Aloha Stadium. Yet when bowl season arrived, there was no slot available for UH. That led to the creation of the Hawai‘i Bowl, which debuted in 2002.
Despite getting first dibs on the game every year since, there have been more Hawai‘i Bowls without Hawai‘i (12) than Hawai‘i Bowls that featured the Rainbow Warriors (9) prior to 2025. Some exceptions on UH's end include a Sugar Bowl bid after going 12-0 in 2007. Additionally, the Hawai‘i Bowl was canceled in 2020 and 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The 'Bows were set to play Memphis in the 2021 Hawai‘i Bowl but withdrew a day before the game because of a COVID outbreak within the team.
The significance of making a bowl game has not been lost among the 2025 Rainbow Warriors, who will square off against California on Dec. 24 at the Clarence T.C. Ching Athletics Complex at 3 p.m.
Hawai‘i hasn't played in the Hawai‘i Bowl since 2019, back when it outlasted BYU 38-34 at Aloha Stadium. It would be the last game Nick Rolovich coached at UH before departing for Washington State. Rolovich will be on the opposite sideline on Dec. 24 as Cal's interim head coach.
Because of the gap between Hawai‘i Bowl appearances, the game will be a brand new experience for members of the team.
"It's a bowl game that I kind of expected to play in every year," safety Peter Manuma told Aloha State Daily. "But things just don't happen that way. Just grateful that we do get to play my senior year.
"This is super rewarding for us. This past week, just sitting back and getting some time to think about what the next steps are in my career and my future, I just couldn't get over the fact that I wanted to play one more game. And we're blessed to have the opportunity to be in Hawai‘i Bowl, staying home and playing one last game in front of our fans."
As a result of making the bowl game, the Rainbow Warriors are allotted an additional 15 practices. Come bowl week, some perks for the 'Bows will include a gift package and extra nights at the team hotel.
Merely taking the field on Christmas Eve will illustrate another important step in the program's rebuild under head coach Timmy Chang, who as a player for UH won two Hawai‘i Bowl MVPs. The Rainbow Warriors have improved their record each year under Chang, going from 3-10 to 2022 to staying in the Mountain West championship race until the final weekend of the regular season in 2025.
"It means a lot, being here for the past [five] years now and just seeing the program just really turn around, and what coach Chang and the rest of the coaches have brought to us players, it's been great. And to finish it off in this way, it's gonna be great," said senior receiver Karsyn Pupunu, a Lahaina native. "This has been a childhood dream of mine to play here for the home state, and just having a great leader like coach Chang to just turn around the whole culture of what we have here in Hawai‘i, and trying to bring it back to the good old days. We've tried to replicate that, and I feel like we're heading the right direction."
Pupunu is one of the few members of the team remaining from the 2021 squad. Back then, a turbulent offseason under head coach Todd Graham, who was picked by David Matlin to replace Rolovich, led to Graham's resignation in January 2022. Graham's departure led to a job search that called Chang home, though he was tasked with a roster rebuild that included bringing in over 50 newcomers in his first season.
"That was a long season for sure," Pupunu says of the 2021 campaign. "I was on the development side. But this season has been a fun experience, and I'm glad that this team has worked for it, and we've earned it, and we just gotta go out there and play the right game."
Rolovich will patrol the Cal sidelines on Dec. 24 before handing off the reins to Tosh Lupoi, which the school chose as the permanent head coach earlier in the month. Additionally, the Bears are led by star freshman quarterback Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele, a Campbell alumnus, who recently committed to returning to Berkeley for another year rather than test the waters in the transfer portal.
"I haven't heard much about what people are talking about, but I'm pretty sure they would be talking about the offensive side of the ball. So, as a defense, we just got to do our job. We probably aren't going to be talked about unless we do good," says Manuma, a fellow Campbell alum. "It's going to be a great game. There's a great team in Cal that's coming in. Jaron is a great quarterback. Everybody knows it. We see it, and it's just all about us enjoying each other as a team one last time, enjoying each other's company, and during the last two and a half weeks that we have together more so than our opponents.
"Although we are getting a great team in Cal, I think [motivation] will come from ourselves and the relationships that we continue to build on this team."
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Christian Shimabuku can be reached at christian@alohastatedaily.com.
