Tyler Griffey has his idiosyncrasies. He curated his own blog during his freshman year at Illinois. His fandom for the St. Louis Cardinals is unparalleled.

This week, in the days leading up to Illinois’s jaunt to the Pacific Ocean for an away game against Hawaii on Friday night and the Maui Invitational, Griffey let slip another one of his idiosyncrasies — he keeps track of every state in which he’s scored a basket in a game. Barring injury or any other unforeseen circumstance, Hawaii will be No. 37.

“He’s traveled more than anyone,” Illinois head coach John Groce joked. “That’s one thing I learned about him this summer. My wife is jealous of Griff because she likes to travel.”

The sand and the surf of Hawaii might be the Illinois basketball team’s environment for the next week, but everyone from Groce on down maintained that the road trip is about business.

That mindset started in Monday night’s 89-64 blowout victory over St. Francis at home, where the Illini bypassed looking ahead to the road trip and soundly thumped the Terriers. Groce praised his seniors and captains for keeping the focus on the St. Francis game and not the extraneous distractions that accompany looming road trips.

The team hopped on a bus to Chicago directly after Monday night’s tilt and flew to Hawaii on Tuesday morning. The Illini will have ample time at the beach over the course of the next week, but Groce planned a special visit for the team to Pearl Harbor, coinciding with Veteran’s Day.

“We went there (Wednesday) morning,” Groce said. “It really put some things in perspective for our guys.”

The business side of the trip for Illinois (2-0), before even the Maui Invitational, begins Friday night against Hawaii. The Warriors have raced out to a 3-0 record after wins over inferior competition in Maryland-Eastern Shore, Arkansas-Pine Bluff and Houston Baptist. Hawaii center Vander Joaquim leads the team in points at 15.3 per game and rebounds at seven per game, and Groce said that Joaquim reminded him of Indiana Pacers forward David West, whom Groce coached as an assistant at Xavier.

“I had a chance to see him on film last year,” Groce said. “Watching him, he has a chance to play for a long time professionally with the way he operates around the basket with his feel and his footwork and his skills.”

Hawaii runs an up-tempo offense comparable to Illinois’s system, which Groce said could challenge the Illini’s transition defense, a weakness Groce has identified on his squad two games into the season.

The Hawaii game marks the first road game under Groce’s tenure at Illinois. The head coach did not give any indication that his team would be rattled by a road atmosphere, but said that the team needed some familiarity with the new coaches’ schedule for road games.

Griffey is excited to hit the road once again, and summed up how the week on the islands of Hawaii will fit into the framework of the season.

“We’ll see where we’re at as a team,” Griffey said.

Thomas can be reached at [email protected] and @ThomasBruch.