Ask University of Hawai'i men's basketball coach Bob Nash about tomorrow's season-opening debut and he prefers to talk about the players. He'll wind on — and on — about the opposition, the schedule, you name it.

Anything but himself.

"It isn't about me," Nash maintains, none too convincingly.

But it is.

Modesty aside, when he returns to the Stan Sheriff Center, where the crowd backed his candidacy for the job with resounding chants of "We Want Nash! We want Nash! ..." just months ago, it most definitely is about him.

Few can name half the new players on the UH roster. Hardly anybody knows whether the opening opponent is the University of San Diego, San Diego State or UC San Diego (it is the first one). But everybody who has any interest in UH sports at all knows who the new coach is.

So, this isn't just another opener for just another Rainbow Warrior season. To be sure, UH has opened with more flamboyant opposition before. It has begun seasons with loftier expectations. Nash might be sliding over only one seat on the bench from where he has spent much of the past 28 years, but it still qualifies as a big move at a school where it is the first change in leadership in 20 years.

Nash's stewardship is big for the fans, who recall the days of the Fabulous Five (1970-72) and see in him the hope of resurrecting it. It was significant for former players who want to see what one of their own fellow stakeholders can do.

It is a big deal for the school which, for the first time, installed an African-American as the coach of a major program. It was huge for the athletic director, Herman Frazier, who ultimately might not have had a whole lot of options in the matter. And it is big for the athletic department bottom line, which needs basketball to return to picking up a bigger piece of the check.

Now, nobody should expect miracles or an overnight success story. That wasn't going to happen no matter who got the job. But in Nash you have to think there is a sporting shot at rebuilding 'Bows basketball. You feel like if there is somebody who was groomed and prepped for this job, it is the man who will be sitting in the head coach's chair come tomorrow.

We've already seen that Nash isn't his predecessor, Riley Wallace, any more than Wallace was Larry Little. Now we're about to see who Nash is. Not the persona so much, since the last quarter-century has well-defined that aspect, but the head coach.

Towel-waving might be cut back (more a result of NCAA fiat than Nash's wishes). The offense is changing, so, too, the recruiting as Nash has begun putting what he likes to call his "stamp" on the program.

All are big things in a program where change has usually come slowly. Which is why tomorrow and a lot of the season really is about Bob Nash.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8044.