As the red ink rains on University of Hawai'i athletics in buckets these days, somewhere up above you imagine Stan Sheriff, the school's late athletic director, pounding a table demanding to know "what the bleep has come of the rainy day fund?"

What, indeed.

A quarter-century ago, progressive thinking people at UH, the Board of Regents and legislature envisioned such a fund as a way to get the burgeoning athletic program through future tough times. For as the late administrator Jack Bonham was fond of saying in what would give the fund its eventual name, "we're only a rainy day or two away from disaster."

UH used to exist on its own gate receipts and the vagaries of state general fund support, giving back its surpluses each year. To give it balance, it was decided that UH would bank its surpluses to be put away for tougher times.

Well, times are as austere as they have ever been at UH where a Board of Regents committee yesterday heard of a $5.4 million net deficit accumulated over the past five years amid projections for $3 million more in red ink in the current fiscal year that ends June 30.

In response to the prospect of a record deficit in a worsening economy, UH is now talking publicly for the first time in decades about the possibility of cutting a sport. Four men's sports — tennis, swimming and diving, volleyball and baseball — have been mentioned if, indeed, it must come to that. Hopefully, it won't because sports once trimmed rarely come back, taking considerable educational opportunities with them.

The last time UH faced a major financial crisis, in the wake of 9/11, the so-called "rainy day fund" came to the rescue. When then-President Evan Dobelle raided discretionary funds, the "rainy day fund" truly saved the day.

But despite some banner years in football, some NCAA and NIT campaigns in men's basketball and continued success in women's volleyball, money was never put back in the "rainy day fund."

Instead, as if someone decided that because there were still checks in the checkbook then it must be OK to continue spending, UH's net deficit accumulated.

If UH wasn't putting away money in the good years, you shudder to think what would happen if it ever hit a rough stretch or the economy went south. Or, both.

Now, we know.

Up to now the Manoa campus administration has generously bailed out athletics by underwriting loans and guaranteeing the checks.

Heaven help UH if that support fades now because the "rainy day fund" no longer can.

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