Solomon Eliminian and the rest of the Warrior defense knew reserve quarterback Tyler Graunke had the skills to lead Hawai'i past Charleston Southern, but they also knew that assuming the helm of the nation's top-ranked offense required confidence in addition to skill.

"We just wanted to help him out by giving him as many chances as possible," Eliminian said. "We wanted to try and make it easy for him by keeping (the Buccaneers) from scoring and getting him good field position."

The Warrior defense held CSU to 311 total yards (72 rushing, 239 passing) and forced the Buccaneers to punt nine times. David Veikune, Joshua Leonard and Amani Purcell also combined for five sacks for a loss of 19 yards.

Adam Leonard, Gerard Lewis and Desmond Thomas each intercepted passes for a total of 96 yards and one touchdown.

"I think they're more comfortable, and having fun playing and not thinking so much," said UH defensive coordinator Greg McMackin. "I think they're getting better, which is more important than the wins and losses."

Still, it took the defense most of the first quarter to get into a groove. CSU quarterback Eli Byrd's 57-yard scoring pass to Dee Brown tied the score and drew a smattering of boos from the Aloha Stadium crowd.

"We knew we just had to shake it off and come back strong," said senior safety Jacob Patek. "We weren't worried, but we told ourselves that we couldn't let them score anymore. We had chances for take-aways, but we didn't come away with the ball."

It was Patek who finished off what might have been the decisive defensive series of the game in the second quarter.

With the Buccaneers at first-and-goal on the UH 2-yard line, Veikune sacked Byrd for a loss of five yards. A false start penalty pushed the ball back to the 12, and Byrd overthrew his receiver on the next down.

Byrd connected on a pass to running back Michael Jefferson, who fumbled the ball while attempting to lateral to a trailing back. Patek recovered the ball to end the threat.

"They tried to run some sort of trick play, but they lost control of the ball and it just ended up in my hands," Patek said.

UH held a tenuous 21-10 lead at the half and McMackin reiterated the lesson he had been preaching all week.

"We needed to score and set up scores," McMackin said. "We had possible interceptions that were dropped and fumbles that weren't recovered in the first half, and I knew we could do better."

Ryan Mouton's jaw-dropping 90-yard kickoff return for a touchdown set the tone for the quarter, but it was Adam Leonard's interception and 36-yard return for another touchdown that blew the game open.

"I think that was the game-breaker," McMackin said.

As the defense went, so, it seemed, did Graunke.

On the next UH possession, Graunke, who had been uneven through the first half, connected on 6 of 7 pass attempts, including a 19-yard scoring pass to Davone Bess to give UH a 42-10 advantage with more than eight minutes left in the quarter.

"To have the opportunity to put points on the board and have them turn the ball over and defend bad field position — all the things you need to do to be a good defense — we did those things tonight," said UH defensive line coach Jeff Reinebold. "Hopefully, that will give us confidence going into the conference schedule and the games where we're going to have to be better against better teams.

"On good football teams, one side of the football team will play good enough long enough for the other side to get its feet under itself, and I think that's what happened tonight," Reinebold said.

Reach Michael Tsai at mtsai@honoluluadvertiser.com.