The University of Hawai'i men's basketball team came up big in an 81-72 victory over Nebraska in the semifinals of the 43rd annual Outrigger Hotels Rainbow Classic last night.

A crowd of 4,537 at the Stan Sheriff Center watched the Rainbow Warriors reach the championship game of the Outrigger Hotels Rainbow Classic for the seventh time in eight years.

Hawai'i, which improved to 7-4, will play Creighton for the tournament championship tonight at 7:30. Nebraska, which dropped to 7-3, will play Houston for third place at 5 p.m.

Hawai'i dominated the inside last night, out-rebounding the Cornhuskers, 45-23, and limiting Nebraska center Aleks Maric to his worst performance of the season.

"We dominated the rebounding, which is a big key," Hawai'i senior co-captain Matt Lojeski said. "It's really hard to beat a team when you get out-rebounded by 20 rebounds. That's a big, big difference."

Lojeski scored 17 points and grabbed eight rebounds to lead a balanced Hawai'i attack.

Ahmet Gueye added 16 points and 11 rebounds, and Bobby Nash contributed 11 points and four rebounds.

Also, Matt Gibson had nine points, seven rebounds and five assists, and Stephen Verwers came off the bench to get six points and a career-high nine rebounds.

It was Hawai'i's third consecutive victory, and third consecutive game reaching 80 points.

"We're really running our offense really well right now," Hawai'i head coach Riley Wallace said.

Lojeski added: "I think people are starting to understand we have a pretty good team here. It's exciting to see the progress."

The 'Bows raced to an 8-0 lead to open the game and then slowly pulled away as the Huskers went through a meltdown that resulted in their best player on the bench and their head coach getting ejected from the game.

Maric was assessed his second foul with 9:46 remaining in the first half, sending him to the bench for the rest of the half.

Nebraska head coach Doc Sadler argued the call with the referees, and was issued a technical foul. Then with 5:13 remaining in the half, and the Huskers trailing, 27-14, Sadler was assessed his second technical foul and was ejected from the game.

"The only thing I will say is that everybody in the coaching profession has a saying that you're never really a coach until you've been thrown out in Hawai'i, so I guess I'm a coach now," Sadler said.

Hawai'i wound up 29 of 39 on free throws to Nebraska's 13 of 18.

Assistant coach Philip Mathews took over for Sadler the rest of the game.

It was the second time in Hawai'i's last three games that the opposing coach was ejected.

Hawai'i used a 15-4 surge to increase its lead to 29-14 midway through the first half. By halftime, the 'Bows had a 43-23 advantage, with Gibson draining a 3-pointer just before the horn sounded to end the half.

It appeared to get worse for the Huskers when Maric limped off the court with what appeared to be an injured left ankle less than a minute into the second half. He returned a few minutes later, but was ineffective the rest of the game.

Maric, who is 6 feet 11 and 270 pounds, finished with season-lows of eight points and three rebounds. He entered the game averaging 19.8 points and 7.6 rebounds per game.

"Our focus, we worked on it in practice, was to push him out of the lane," Verwers said. "Take away his easy buckets."

Verwers and P.J. Owsley took turns defending Maric, who only played 18 minutes due to his foul and injury problems.

"P.J. started us out ... and then Verwers came in and took it to another level," Wallace said.

Nebraska used a full-court pressure defense to cut a 21-point Hawai'i lead down to seven in the closing seconds of the game.

"If we can find a way to finish the last 10 minutes of a game, we'll be blowing teams out by 30," Lojeski said.

Hawai'i wound up committing 22 turnovers that led directly to 40 points for the Huskers.

Ryan Anderson led the Huskers with 29 points, including 7 of 13 shooting from 3-point range. Charles Richardson added 13 points and eight assists.

Reach Dayton Morinaga at dmorinaga@honoluluadvertiser.com.