100 Days, 100 Reasons G6 Football Matters

It was a cultural celebration of the Islands broadcast to the world. Tribal drummers led the team onto the field. Torch-carrying warriors chanted. Sacred ti leaf leis lined the sidelines. Twenty minutes before kickoff, the Rainbow Warriors performed the Ha’a Koa — the Dance of the Warrior — a ritual rooted in ancient Hawaiian lua, hula and oli. On every first down, the PA cracked with “Chee hoo!” and the crowd roared it back.

Then the run-and-shoot took over — four wide, a sidearm-slinging quarterback and an offense that didn’t care what time zone you were in. It was midnight on the East Coast and the game was still on. If you found it — flipping channels, following a tip, staying up for no good reason — you didn’t turn it off.

That was Hawaii football under June Jones.

Jones arrived in 1999 and inherited a program that had gone 0-12. The Rainbow Warriors hadn’t won in 18 games. He installed the run-and-shoot, the same offense Mouse Davis built and Warren Moon made famous, and went 9-4 in his first season — at the time, the biggest single-season turnaround in NCAA history.

Then he found his quarterbacks.

Chang

Timmy Chang threw for 17,072 career yards from 2000 to 2004 — more than any quarterback in NCAA history at the time. He started 50 of 53 games, still holds the NCAA record for career pass attempts and total plays, and turned Aloha Stadium into a place where offenses went to put up numbers that didn’t look real. Chang wasn’t just a system quarterback running the run-and-shoot. He was the reason the system worked.

Brennan

Colt Brennan took what Chang built and made the entire country pay attention. In 2006, he threw 58 touchdown passes — an NCAA single-season record at the time. His career completion percentage of 70.4% is still the best in NCAA history. In 2007, he led Hawaii to a 12-0 regular season, a spot in the Sugar Bowl and a third-place finish in Heisman Trophy voting.

A quarterback playing home games 2,500 miles from the mainland was a Heisman finalist. People who had never set foot in Honolulu knew his name. When the BCS announced Hawaii’s Sugar Bowl bid on December 2, 2007, more than 7,500 fans packed the Stan Sheriff Center just to watch it on television. The Honolulu Advertiser ran a one-word front-page headline the next morning: “Sweet!” Local businesses bought congratulatory ads before the bowl game was even played.

“It’s so cool and neat how everything worked out for us,” Brennan said. “We can’t wait to have a happy new year.”

McKenzie Milton, who went on to start at UCF and Florida State, said it years later: “I still want to be like Colt Brennan. The way he played the game, that’s everything you want to emulate.”

Brennan died on May 11, 2021. He was 37. Hawaii’s governor said what the islands already knew: “He will always be remembered for his brilliance, his leadership and how he and his team brought the people of Hawaii together.”

The Island Tax

Power conference teams flew to Honolulu for exempt games and bowl matchups. They didn’t always leave with what they expected. Alabama lost 37-29 in 2003. Michigan State fell 41-38 in the 2004 Hawaii Bowl. Purdue came in 2006 and watched Brennan throw three fourth-quarter touchdowns — including the game-winner with 1:27 left — in a 42-35 loss. In 2007, Washington fell 35-28 as Hawaii clinched a 12-0 regular season. In 2001, No. 9 BYU arrived at Aloha Stadium undefeated at 12-0. Hawaii beat them 72-45.

Jones finished 76-41 at Hawaii with two WAC championships. He gave the program an identity — the run-and-shoot, the war dance, the late-night kickoffs, the feeling that anything could happen on any given Saturday in the middle of the Pacific.

Full Circle

Timmy Chang came home in 2022 to rebuild it. He went 3-10 his first year. Then 5-8. Then 5-7. He didn’t flinch.

In 2025, Hawaii went 9-4, erased a 21-0 deficit to beat Cal in the Hawaii Bowl and Chang was named AFCA Region 5 Coach of the Year.

“The first three years taught us the ways not to fight through adversity,” Chang said. “And this year has taught us the ways that we can handle adversity and continue to propel ourselves.”

He knows where it comes from.

“I’m June Jones through and through,” he said, “and I’m proud to say that.”

They told you it didn’t matter. Here are 100 reasons it does.