Just one week after reaching what appeared to be a high point of the season, the University of Hawai'i men's basketball team took a steep drop yesterday.

UC Riverside, a team that had won just six games prior to yesterday, defeated the Rainbow Warriors, 79-62, in a nonconference game before 1,214 at the Student Rec Center in Riverside, Calif.

"I don't know what to say," Hawai'i head coach Bob Nash said. "It's just a very difficult loss to have to take."

Hawai'i dropped to 11-14 overall with its second consecutive loss. The 'Bows are 7-5 and in fifth place in the Western Athletic Conference.

The Highlanders improved to 7-17. They are 3-9 and tied for seventh place in the Big West Conference.

Hawai'i played without starting point guard and leading scorer Matt Gibson, who sat out with an apparent aggravated knee injury. Gibson, who missed the first four games of this season with a knee injury, is averaging 16.7 points and 5.1 assists per game.

"At this point, I don't know," Nash said of Gibson's status. "He needs to get treatment. He needs to see the doctor when we get back (to Honolulu), and we'll take it from there."

Freshman Kareem Nitoto made the first start of his career in place of Gibson yesterday. He finished with a career-high 13 points, including 8-of-8 shooting on free throws.

"When you don't have your normal point guard in there running the show ... we just didn't get into our sets quick enough or good enough to get the shooters the ball in a place where they could do something with it," Nash said. "But having said that, I thought Kareem did a good job of filling in for Matt."

Riley Luettgerodt added 13 points and seven rebounds for Hawai'i. Bobby Nash contributed 12 points, and Jared Dillinger and Bill Amis scored 10 each.

But it was hardly enough to overcome a UCR team that shot 57.4 percent from the field, and got a record-breaking performance from senior guard Larry Cunningham.

"I thought our defense was totally lacking," Nash said. "When you give up 53 (percent shooting) in the first half and 61 in the second half, that shows that we just didn't play solid defense. I don't know if we were dead tired. I don't know what the problem was. But we just didn't have the fire, the energy, to come out and compete. I put that all on me that these guys didn't get ready to come out and compete."

Cunningham scored 31 points and became UCR's all-time leading scorer with 1,390 career points. He went 10 of 15 from the field and 8 of 8 on free throws.

He scored 16 in the first half, helping the Highlanders to a 34-20 lead at intermission.

Hawai'i never got closer than eight in the second half. The 'Bows shot just 41.5 percent from the field, and made a season-low 17 field goals.

The shorter UCR team also out-rebounded the 'Bows, 30-23.

Led by Nitoto's 8-for-8, the 'Bows had a productive night at the free-throw line, going 25 of 30.

Hawai'i departed for the road last week following an uplifting 71-66 home victory over Utah State. Since then, the 'Bows suffered disappointing road losses at Fresno State and UCR.

"We just have to go home and get ourselves back together," Nash said. "This doesn't hurt us in our standings in terms of conference play."

Hawai'i will play its final two home games of the season this week. The 'Bows will host Idaho on Thursday, and then first-place Boise State on Saturday.