After going neck and neck for eight quarters last year, Pac-Five and coach Kip Botelho know as much about Roosevelt as anyone does.
Unfortunately for the Wolf Pack, Botelho can throw all of that game footage aside.
Kui Kahooilihala‘s Rough Riders are a completely different animal this year, riding a passing offense and stifling defense that has obliterated everyone in its path. Pac-Five will be tasked with slowing it on Friday at Aloha Stadium.
Roosevelt is 4-0 this year, their best start since beginning 6-0 in 1974 with George Doi under center for their third-place finish in the OIA.
The Rough Riders have outscored their four opponents 166-13. That ratio won’t keep up, of course, the school record for offense is 36.0 by Les Parilla‘s troops in 1999 and the defensive mark is 6.3 by Ticky Vasconcellos‘ championship team in 1957.
The current edition of Rough Riders go into the Pac-Five game boasting of 10 straight shutout quarters, within the school record of 13 by Milton Kam and the 1957 squad.
The Wolf Pack have never beaten the Rough Riders, going 5-0-1 with the lone tie coming in 1990. Roosevelt beat Pac-Five twice last year, 17-15 on a field goal with no time remaining before Sky Ogata became quarterback and 20-7 for its first state tournament victory.
Ogata has kept the gun in its holster recently due to repeated blowouts, but the quarterback has already thrown for 1,024 yards and 12 touchdowns this year after finishing with 1,185 and seven last season.
His top receiver, Chase Akana, already has 304 yards after Scott Chung led the team with 318 last year. Chung is also ahead of last year’s pace with 197.
Roosevelt is 21-2 in its last 23 contests and Kahooilihala is 10 games over .500 in his five-year career at Roosevelt, the first Rough Riders coach to do that since Rodney Iwasaki in 1987.
It won’t be easy against Chase Hedani‘s Pac-Five crew, which is riding a two-game winning streak after repairing a defense that showed up late for the season with losses to Kaimuki and Kaiser.
Hedani has been a game manager so far this year, failing to complete half of his attempts in a game this year but throwing only three interceptions. With Bryson Ho getting such limited work out of the backfield he carries a lot of burden on moving the offense by hitting Kama Espinda, Ian Canute, Angelo Coluccio and Kaala Tam.
Pac-Five will be looking for its first three-game winning streak since 2015. Pac-Five has lost 13 straight games at Aloha Stadium. Roosevelt is looking for its first Stadium winning streak since 1992.
Roosevelt very impressive the last couple of years.
Good job Kui & Staff..
Anthony Montielh is the brain of the offense for the last 2 years reason why Roosevelt is doing good….Roosevelt aka St. Louis jr.
@truth
Why gotta be STL jr? Another guy saying Mililouis?
It’s funny how the Loyal(fake) STL fans getting jealous about kids leaving STL & finding success elsewhere.🤣
Much better than being 3rd-4th string waiting on the blowout to get in the game!
You write a story about Roosevelt football team and don’t mention Shepherd Kekahuna? You betta ask somebody! Lol
Ask us at Pearl City. One of their Hammah’s
Never heard much from Roosevelt throughout my life while observing Hawai’i high school football, but “The Rough Riders have outscored their four opponents 166-13” and being undefeated so far definitely puts them on the radar for me. Good for them! I believe splitting the state into 3 divisions also brings attention to more schools like this. Awesome job Rough Riders. Good luck to you and especially good luck for those teams who have to face you! Haha
If a team wants to beat Roosevelt, they have to play 48 minutes of consistent error free football. The only weakness the Rough Riders have (if you want to call it that) is that the front offensive line has had too many holding calls for a team of their caliber. They are a “DI” studded team, who I think has the best opportunity to beat the current DII state champs.
Jerry, you write a column titled about Roosevelt yet you’re mainly mentioning Pac-Five coaches and players. And as for Roosevelt not keeping up their outscoring ratio, well that’s soon to be seen. Roosevelt has every opportunity to steam roll Pac-Five as well. This team of the Rough Riders is mainly consisted of students that have been balling together since their freshman year. This team is tight and their determined. Good Luck to both teams.
I’m waiting to see what Roosevelt’s defense brings to the table and I’m even more excited to see what my nephew Keneke Gusman can do positioned at defensive end…LET’S GO 44!!! Sack Master..you go earn that title Neko’s.
Wait a minute … Roosevelt is D2? How did that happen? No wonder they smashing everybody they play. They should be in D1 especially after the St. Francis boys transferred in.
Falcon future
2 years with winning record then roosevelt can move up.
Not all St.francis boys.
I get riders by 40pts over wolfpac
Some of you may have forgotten who was the MVP Player when Saint Francis beat PAC 5 on TV at the Aloha Stadium last year. That Player was Shepherd Kekahuna and he now plays at Roosevelt along with
a few others that transferred there when Saint Francis had to close it doors. He plays mostly on Defense now
because Roosevelt’s offense is loaded with talented
Offensive Players…Go Riders…
I agree with the Roosevelt backers here. This game is pretty much a lock … Roosevelt will blow out Pac5. In fact, Roosevelt should blow out everybody until it gets to D2 states. Then it will come down to a showdown with the sandbaggers from Maui island.
Roosevelt is probably the best team in OIA D2 and certainly benefitted by adding MORE good players, the SF boys. But they were good before them too. I would rank them first in OIA D2 but I do not see them blowing out Kaimuki or Kaiser, either of those teams could also beat Roosevelt. 3 solid teams should be fun to watch down the stretch. Good luck to 3 solid programs with good coaching
Roosevelt commits waaaay too many penalties. If they play this kind of ball against Kaiser, Lahinaluna or even Kapaa, they will not be state champs. If they can clean up this part of their game, then yea, they get chance.