Is Kaleikini the baseball player? I was told that he didn’t play basketball since middle school, if he’s that kid.

Where did you hear that the ILH D2 has three berths? Last I check they had only two, which were Saint Francis and UH lab last year. I know the ILH D2 went down from 9 teams to 6 so I don’t know how their postseason playoffs workout now. If i remember correctly, SFS won the regular season last year, getting an automatic bid into states. The remaining 8 teams had a tournament to determine the second spot.

Agree with you about Coach Walt. Over the years, he extracts every ounce of effort and skill from his teams. I like their PG Anthony Canencia, and Kaleikini is a sleeper, a baseball guy who didn’t play hoops in high school until senior year. They have some nice piece, not much experience. And, of course, not a lot of depth. Their best teams in the past decade or so had experience and knew how to work in Coach’s system. We shall see!

Kapi King is a legitimate big man who can play on the blocks and run the court and he’s only a junior. Ikari got into early foul trouble, 2 fouls in the 1st against HBA forcing Damien to go with Layco as the primary ball handler. Layco missed about 7-8 point blank layups in their 1-4 low set. Never seen him miss so many in close. Damien never got into a rhythm and the homecoming crowd definitely played a major factor. Damien had 3 technicals called on them, one on King when he got tangled up with a HBA player giving him his 3rd and 4th fouls with 6 minutes remaining in the 3rd.

St. Francis will be there at the end. Coach Batoon will have them playing their best at the end of the season. Coach Walt Quitan at University High has 2 players in PG Canencia and SG Kaleikini and will always gets his boys to overachieve. The Jr. Bows have not made it a states final in recent memory and Coach Quitan doesn’t get the credit he deserves. No one in the ILH does more with less.

Well put, Kani Kapila! Please keep posting on HBA, ILH and statewide D-II.

I saw St. Francis several times in preseason. They can’t help that so many talented players graduated. I give the Saints credit for this: it would’ve been tempting to turn Matthew Nuumanaia into a go-to guy on every possession. But they run their offensive sets, call an occasional play for him (that corner 3 play is sweet) and let things unfold naturally.

If they’d done things differently, Nuumanaia might have been run ragged by now. He might have averaged 35 ppg, but what would be left in the tank? As long as they’re in the playoff picture, which is very do-able, they can try and save his go-to exploits for the playoff/elimination scenarios.

The ILH’s D-II is obviously not as strong as it was last year. Hanalani, St. Francis and University are down. Don’t see any ILH D-II team able to contend with the likes of HPA, Kalani or Kaiser but with 3 state berths for the ILH D-II, it will be a dog-fight. Projected State Berths – 1. Damien 2. HBA 3. St. Francis.