{"id":218549,"date":"2025-07-11T13:56:32","date_gmt":"2025-07-11T23:56:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=218549"},"modified":"2025-07-11T13:56:32","modified_gmt":"2025-07-11T23:56:32","slug":"vulcan-joins-nba-summer-league","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2025\/07\/11\/vulcan-joins-nba-summer-league\/","title":{"rendered":"Toronto Raptors name former UH<\/abbr> Hilo Vulcan to summer league roster"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading time: <\/span> < 1<\/span> minute<\/span><\/span>

\"Aniwaniwa<\/p>\n

Former University of Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> at Hilo men\u2019s basketball<\/a> player Aniwaniwa Tait-Jones is set to compete on the national stage as one of 16 players named to the Toronto Raptors\u2019 roster for the 2025 NBA<\/abbr> 2K26 Summer League in Las Vegas.<\/p>\n

\"Aniwaniwa<\/p>\n

Tait-Jones, a native of New Zealand, was a member of head coach Kaniela Aiona\u2019s inaugural recruiting class in 2020. In his three seasons with the Vulcans, he became a cornerstone of the program, earning PacWest Conference Freshman and Newcomer of the Year honors, three All-PacWest First Team selections and three All-West Region accolades. He surpassed 1,000 career points, finishing fifth in program history in points, free throws and rebounds.<\/p>\n

“I loved it,” Tait-Jones said of his time at UH<\/abbr> Hilo. “The coaching staff was amazing, and I consider them family for life.”<\/p>\n

After the 2022–23 season, Tait-Jones transferred to UC<\/abbr> San Diego, where he finished his collegiate career. He was named Big West Conference Newcomer of the Year in 2023–24 and Player of the Year in 2024–25.<\/p>\n

“I consider Hilo my second home. I love the people of Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>,” he told Hawaii News Now. “They were just really supportive of me throughout the whole process.”<\/p>\n

Tait-Jones is the second player recruited by Aiona to appear in the NBA<\/abbr> Summer League, joining Ross Williams who was named to the Detroit Pistons in 2024.<\/p>\n

Read more at Hiloathletics.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Aniwaniwa Tait-Jones was one of 16 named to the team\u2019s summer league roster.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1362],"tags":[58,82,14,151],"class_list":["post-218549","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-athletics","tag-athletics","tag-basketball","tag-uh-hilo","tag-hilo-athletics","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218549","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218549"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218549\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":218570,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218549\/revisions\/218570"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218549"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218549"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218549"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}