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Originally Posted by brendons31
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of course the All Black one is better, technically speaking. I see you're from Spain, so you probably didn't get the impact of the UH one. First, culturally, the polynesian members of the team introduced it as a way to instill team unity and everyone bought in. from Colt Brennan (white boy from SoCal) to Devon Bess (Black guy from Oakland), they were all committed to doing it and it probably contributed a lot to the success of this mid-major team. There weren't any Maori team members, but I think the Samoans brought in their version (every island group had their own haka/haa/haa hula war dance that their warriors used to train with back in the day, so to say that it wasn't authentic maori is true but misleading a bit.
last, the effect it had on thier opponents was priceless. sterile midwest farmer boys had never seen anything so wild and it scared them a bit. UH was innundated with complaints about the wild, heathen, war mongering ritual to the point where the conference banned it on the field before games (UH continues to perform it before games, but not on the field). it all added to and solidified the team's image as a wild, crazy, strong and united team to be reckoned with.