Saturday night's University of Hawai'i men's basketball game against New Mexico State would be the annual "Senior Night" for the Rainbow Warriors — if they had any.

Instead, what they have are seven juniors. Well, eight, if you count their head coach, Bob Nash.

Nash, you see, is concluding the penultimate season of his original three-year deal, meaning that without a rollover, the next season is the last one for which he is contracted.

That is a situation UH should remedy sooner rather than later with an extension.

National letter of intent day is April 15 and for a team that is in the hunt for some junior college recruits, not to mention a transfer or high school player, projecting some stability for the head coach right now is not only a good idea but a necessity.

Before they sign on the dotted line, players want to know whom they'll play for and few things raise more of a red flag about a program than a coach in contract limbo.

For UH this is a particularly crucial recruiting year. The 'Bows need to plug only a couple of pukas to be on the verge of good things next season.

Get an honest-to-goodness point guard and a consistent shooter with the two scholarships the 'Bows have open — or a big man with one of a couple grants that are likely to come up when somebody leaves — and this team could compete for a Western Athletic Conference championship.

Of course, there's a good chance UH might be doing just that right now if Nash had been hired a few weeks earlier than things turned out. He was belatedly announced as Riley Wallace's successor on April 13, 2007, two days after the start of the letter of intent period. At least two players UH had been in the running for were unable to wait to see what would happen with the coaching search here and went elsewhere.

More than a few times this season we've been left to speculate on where UH would be if one — or both — had found their way to Manoa.

To be sure the 'Bows' current 13-15 record (5-10 in the WAC) isn't where we had hoped they would be at this point. Too many close games have gotten away late.

And while athletic director Jim Donovan, not to mention the fans, can't be too happy about that, there needs to be an understanding of the big picture here. If this program is to be returned to postseason regularity it is going to take more than the current investment in Nash. It is going to require showing a little more confidence in the man and the degree of difficulty of his mission.

Nash and the 'Bows have been playing with one hand tied behind their backs for the late start on the 2007 recruiting season. Not providing them every chance to turn things around in 2009-10 would be to foolishly constrain the other one as well.

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