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This is the extended story on Thursday’s quarterfinal matchup at the boys basketball state tourney. The published story is in this morning’s Honolulu Star-Advertiser. (subscriber content) This time, it wasn’t quite so close. When they last met, Kalaheo needed a buzzer-beating putback by Alec MacLeod to edge Punahou in the final of the Punahou Invitational two months ago. On Thursday, Kalaheo left no doubt with a resounding 64-48 victory over the top-seeded Buffanblu in the quarterfinals of the New City […]

Not one league champion in the bunch. The dust has settled in the Division I boys basketball state championships, and we’re left with OIA second-place Kahuku (14-2), ILH second-place ‘Iolani (10-4), OIA third-place Kalaheo (15-1), and OIA fifth-place Campbell (13-2). Gone are the top-four seeds — ILH champion Punahou, OIA first-place Farrington, MIL titlist Lahainaluna, and BIIF winner Konawaena. Three of the remaining teams come in with some serious bigs — 6-foot-8 Hugh Hogland of the Raiders, 6-7 David Marrero […]

The field has pared off four entrants from 12 to eight. The Division I state tourney is in full gear tonight with four games of meaning. Yesterday’s opening round gave underdogs plenty of opportunity, but none could walk away with victory in hand. Nope. It wasn’t to be. Maui ran and ran, shot better than 50 percent from the field and still lost to Kalaheo 77-65. The Sabers had 39 turnovers, early double their number of field goals made. Playing […]

Moanalua came really, really close to knocking off Kahuku on Wednesday night. Na Menehune led by nine points at one point before the Red Raiders — feared as a legitimate state-title contender — whittled away that advantage and took over for a 49-48 win in the first round of the boys basketball state tournament at Moanalua’s gym. It would have ranked as a huge upset if Na Menehune (8-8) prevailed over the Red Raiders (13-2). Had Kahuku’s Keanu Akina not […]

Cinderella knocked on the door, but she never entered tonight’s games after all. In both opening-round games at McKinley Student Council Gymnasium on Wednesday, underdogs had favorites on the ropes. In both matchups, it looked very much like Kamehameha-Hawaii had a real shot to knock out Campbell, and Leilehua had a chance to put ILH runner-up ‘Iolani away. Instead, Campbell, the OIA’s fifth-place team, rallied from a 30-26 deficit for a 42-34 win. The senior-heavy team found a way to […]