Hawaii Bowl a Full Circle Moment for Rolovich and Chang

There’s no question that Wednesday’s Sheraton Hawaii Bowl showdown in Honolulu is a full circle moment for Cal head coach Nick Rolovich and Hawaii head coach Timmy Chang, who both quarterbacked the Rainbow Warriors and saw great success a quarter century ago. Now they’ll square off against each other in a game that has special importance to both programs.

"Just want thank the Hawaii Bowl, the state of Hawaii, for putting on a first class bowl experience for for our team, and both teams," Chang said. "Truly grateful to be here playing in this this game. As you can see, it's a table full of local boys, and that's pretty special. So we look forward to playing a great game and showing the world on Christmas Eve how great this game is. I just want to thank everybody and all the people that that go into this year round to make this bowl full game very special. Thank you."

X / Cal Football

Former Hawaii teammates Timmy Chang and Nick Rolovich

"Yeah, I agree with that," Rolovich said. "Being able to represent Cal and get into this bowl game, this is probably, I haven't been to every bowl game, but as far as bowl experiences for the players is as first class as it gets. Obviously, the backdrop and the cultural experiences the kids get to experience when they're here is is incredible. The Sheraton Bowl committee, thank you guys for inviting us. Probably some of the greatest story lines in bowl season this year. I think it'll be heavily anticipated and watched. I think a Hawaii team that plays very hard, believes in each other, represents the state very well, and having two local boys kind of leading our our team at Cal bringing that same cultural effect to the locker room, it has all the ingredients of a incredible bowl game on Christmas Eve where we're the only game on. So, grateful to be here, grateful to be here with Timmy. So much great history with us."

Rolovich arrived at Hawaii just months before Chang but had an experience advantage after starring as a JC All-American for CCSF before arriving as an early entrant in spring of 2000 with two years of eligibility. After limited duty as a junior, Rolovich passed for 3,361 yards and 34 TDs as a senior, capping his career with a record-setting 543 passing yards and 8 TDs in a game, earning Hula Bowl MVP, and becoming a Dallas Cowboys mini-camp invitee before a brief pro career in NFL Europe and Arena Football before starting his coaching career. He eventually returned to his alma mater in 2003 as a student assistant then later as QB coach and OC and after a stint at Nevada as a head coach 2016 to 2019.

Chang arrived at Hawaii as a fall enrollee in 2000 and though Rolovich had the experience advantage, the frosh QB earned the starting nod in 2000. Chang passed for 3041 yards though he hadn’t yet hit his stride, completing 52% of his passes along with 19 TDs and 19 INTs. After redshirting in 2001 when Rolovich starred as a senior, Chang went on to set NCAA career records for passing yards (17,072) and touchdowns (117), completing 1,388 of 2,436 passes for a 57% clip, becoming a 4-time All-WAC player.

The fact that Rolovich has the chance to come back to Hawaii, leading the Bears to a bowl game as an unexpected head coach after being out of collegiate football for a few years is not lost on the interim HC.

“I hope it's not the completion of the circle, but Hawaii's given me so much of my life when I when I chose to come here from junior college, from friends, to my wife, which leads to my children and my chosen career in football. And you probably couldn't have written this a few years back that this was going to be the case. But Hawaii will forever be special to me, personally and what it gave me as a young man, as far as the opportunity to explore something new, kind of having that Magellan mindset of taking a risk believing in the coaches that that recruited me here and the offensive system that I desired to play in. But all that is secondary to the the characteristics of the local culture and how people live in Aloha here, and how it works at all over the world if you let it and that's probably changed my life the most.”

Chang got his coaching start as a grad assistant for former Hawaii head coach June Jones at SMU in 2012, eventually returning to Hawaii as head coach in 2022, where he gradually rebuilt the program into an 8-game winner so far this season after the Hawaii program had been down for several years. 

"I think one of the my earliest memories of Timmy was on Wednesday, we will play in the same spot on this island where I first remember throwing with Timmy when he came in as a freshman, on the old Cook Field, the old turf, right in front of the offices and with all the boys in the summertime," Rolovich said. I think that makes it even more special that the games not only played in Hawaii, but played kind of right there in that spot. And I don't think at that time we thought about coaching against each other.

“I don't think we could have written that, but when this game grabs you and infects you and gives you that disease, it's hard to it's hard to break away, even if you want to. And I think Timmy's had to grind. I've had a grind to get to this point, and it's just it's hard to believe that it's happening, but it is very special for at least me and him and all the boys who played at UH together.”

Kickoff for Wednesday’s Christmas Eve game will be 5 pm PST on ESPN.