Konawaena wins D1 State Title

(Photo Credit: Mike Burley/Star-Bulletin)

On Thursday night when I got the results from the Girls Division I Semifinal Games with Punahou and Konawaena, I had an idea that we were going to be in for something special. Both teams fought through adversity just to get to the championship, beating tough foes in Lahinaluna and Farrington, respectively. Little did I know that the "something special" would turn into, arguably, the greatest State Title game in memory.

The defending champs fought tooth and nail with the Wildcats from Kealakekua through the opening quarter, as the Buffanblu had an early 9-8 lead in the first eight minutes. Konawaena started to make their move in the second quarter, paced by Lia Galderia's three field goals and seven points from Kimberly Brown off the bench. Those two were the only Wildcats to score, and they outdid the Buffanblu 13-9 in the 2nd quarter to take a halftime advantage.

Brown and Galdeira continued their solid play in the 3rd quarter, combining for 11 of the teams 17 3rd period points to bulge their lead to 9. We also started to see Janelle Nomura try to take the team on her shoulders. She only got 4 points of her 20 in that period, but she started to wildly drive to the bucket, leading to three offensive fouls, two of them in the 3rd.

A nine point lead at the 3rd-4th quarter bridge would increase to eleven before Konawaena would begin to crumble. Nomura put 7 points on the board for Punahou in the 4th quarter, while Konawaena could only manage one field goal, which came from Lia Galdeira. Nomura tied the game with mere seconds remaining, and Galdeira missed an open three at the buzzer to send it to overtime tied at 44.

The 1st Overtime was fairly uneventful, with both teams having opportunities at the free throw line, but only able to hit one from the charity stripe, to send things to a 2nd Overtime tied at 45.

The 2nd Overtime was where Galdeira started to shine. She put in all of the Wildcats three extra session field goals (10/16 FG's on the night) to pull Konawaena ahead for good. Coach Bobby Awa was able to clear the bench with a few seconds remaining to allow her entire team the chance to get on the floor to play in the Championship game. Konawaena wins their 3rd State Title with a 54-50 win over Punahou.

The amazing thing is that with an announced 1,687 in attendance at the NBC, most of the fans were rooting for the Neighbor Island Wildcats. When the TV timeouts would take place, the Kona-favored crowd would sing loudly "Let's Go Kona! Kona, Let's Go!" And when the Punahou cheerleaders would run onto the floor to do their routines, they would get hearty boo's from the Wildcat faithful. I've never seen that kind of lopsided crowd in favor of a team that was truly, in all senses of the word, a visitor.

NOTES: The entire Vulcan Girls Basketball team had made their way to the Blaisdell from McCabe gym after their loss to Hawaii Pacific University. Senior Forward Jessica Hanato stayed back well after the game was over, wearing a Konawaena basketball t-shirt and celebrating with the rest of the Konawaena crowd at least a good 25 minutes plus after the finish. Also in attendance was Oahu Radio personality Billy V, who is a Konawaena grad. He was wearing a Green and White Konawaena Polo Shirt with black Konawaena shorts.

First Hawaiian Bank / HHSAA State Football Tournament Information

Big thank you to Lyle Crozier, the Interim Executive Director of the BIIF, for giving me a hollar and asking me to pass along the following information:

All HHSAA State Football Games will start at 7:30 pm on Friday. The games are as follows:

Division I:

Kealakehe vs. Farrington (Ticky Vasconcellos Stadium, Oahu) - Aired on OC16 and Starcomm Sports Radio Network

Leilehua vs. Baldwin (War Memorial Stadium, Maui)

Division II:

Campbell vs. Konawaena (Julian R. Yates Field, Kealakekua) - Aired on ESPN Radio

Radford vs. Kauai (Vidinha Stadium, Kauai)

HHSAA / HIADA Voting Issues

I just recently posted my corner article for HawaiiSportsPage.com on the voting problems that continue to set us back in the HHSAA.

I don't want to give all of it away (of course, I want you to go there and read it), but I did want to mention an idea that may better solve the problems that we are facing here.

We need to have one or thw other. The HHSAA is proving the HIADA worthless when they vote down the resolutions that are discussed and voted on by the athletic directors, yet the HIADA process seems to be the better suited process to make decisions that are less about league agenda and more about benefiting the individual schools and, eventually, the athletes.

Do you have a different idea on how you would like to see decisions made? Leave your comments here and we will discuss...

Also, if you have a blog, leave a link to it. If I like it, I'll add it to our "Bloglist" on the right hand side of the page!

State Baseball Tournament: Day One Thoughts

Hello From Oahu,

Congratulations to Kamehameha, and Kohala for winning in Day one of the tournament. And they both did it with good pitching.

Kohala's Blaise Kise threw a complete game, striking out nine, and getting himself out of trouble in the last few innings. In fact, he left two on base to end the sixth, and allowed a couple runs in the seventh before shutting the door.

Meanwhile, from Patssy T. Mink Central Oahu Regional Park field 1 over to Les Murakami Stadium, and Kamehameha's Blake Amaral. He had his tough moments, including a HBP and some one-run-allowed innings, but the middle to back part of the order helped him out in the sixth, including help from the Kailua defense, as an E6 and E3 helped bring in the go-ahead runs in the sixth. Amaral, however, settled down late, and struck out a couple in the final frame, and eight for the game. Talking to some of the people in the press box after the game, the word they used to describe Corey Ishigo's team: Undisciplined. And it showed defensively in the sixth.

Couple of things already needed to look at for next year. We NEED a working scoreboard at Central Oahu Regional Park. To me, it's a little embarassing that people just walking can't tell the score, and that they don't even have official scorers. In fact during the HPA broadcast we did, the official scorer was actually the guy taking stats for Maryknoll. Oh BTW, you forgot to add the run that HPA picked up in the 5th. The final score in the HPA game should read 15-1, not 15-0.

Oh, and one more thing. No one told me that there is a hospitality room for the media, so I didn't have to go downstairs at Murakami and buy a hot dog and mountain dew. I found out that they had sandwiches and drinks there.

Big thank you to my taxi driver, Nam. Got tipped pretty well Wednesday, as I was pretty much his only client from the hotel to Murakami to CORP and back to the hotel. I'm saving my receipts.

Schedule for Thursday:

11:15 am (after a special baseball edition of the Josh Pacheco Show)

Kamehameha-Hawaii vs. Maui

1:45 pm

Saint Louis vs. Waiakea

And, by the way, Friday's edition of the Josh Pacheco Show will be LIVE from the Ilima Hotel conference room. You can e-mail, call-in, text in, all the same. I just won't be in the studio. But we will have "Yes-naka" running the board and answering the calls.