Hall pass: Sarah Lau

Athletes like Sarah Lau don’t come around every year.

Kamehameha’s Lau completed a career as a standout in volleyball, soccer and track and field and will be honored for it with an induction into the Enterprise / HHSAA Hall of Honor on June 7 at Dole Cannery Square’s Pomaikai Ballroom.

To find the last girl to pull that unique trifecta of sports and do them well enough to reach the hall, you have to go way back to 2002 when Tiana Lum-Tucker played those three sports — and three others on top of them — for Kauai in 2002. Sarah Clark, who was inducted in 1996, played all three and added basketball for Hawaii Prep.

Lau was actually discouraged from doing all three, but she found that they complemented each other and made her the athlete she is. This is the 10th straight year Kamehameha will have an athlete honored at the banquet, but none of them have meant more to as many teams as she has.

Lau’s varsity career began as a sophomore, after contributing to ILH runner-up teams in intermediate volleyball and JV soccer. When she stepped up the the varsity in volleyball, much of the team was set but she still contributed to an ILH title and run through the state tournament until a loss to Carly Kan’s Punahou squad even though she never got off the bench in the championship. She played a bigger part in Kamehameha’s soccer season, but that team didn’t reach the state tournament.

Lau’s steady improvement continued before her junior year, and although she saw the floor in only two sets of Kamehameha’s run to the state championship in volleyball, she played a big part in their ILH title and was on the all-tournament team at the Durango Classic early in the season and made honorable mention on the Star-Advertiser’s Fab 15.

It was her eighth year of volleyball, and she hit her junior year completely polished in her 12th year as a soccer player. She anchored Kamehameha’s defense with Shyann Moriguchi and paired with her to provide a lethal scoring threat on throw-ins and the Warriors shrugged off a second-place finish in the ILH to sweep through the state tournament. Her impact led to her first appearance on a Star-Advertiser All-State team and she was one of five girls from Kamehameha on the HHSAA’s all-tournament team.

With two state titles already, Lau joined the track and field team at head coach Harvey McInerny’s request and aimed for a sweep. She fell short of a state title, but anchored two relay teams to ILH crowns and McInerny says that in his 17 years he had never put a new runner in such an important position.

2014 Hall of Honor recipent Alohi Robins-Hardy graduated and left Lau to fill in for her around the net. Lau picked up the challenge and helped the Warriors to their second-straight ILH title and did it in dominating fashion. The Warriors tripped up in the state final and lost to Punahou after beating them all year, but Lau was so important to the effort that she made the HHSAA all-tournament team and cracked the Star-Advertiser’s Fab 15 despite only being second team in the ILH.

Injuries decimated the soccer team in her senior season and the Warriors failed to reach the state tournament, but Lau was still recognized as the bright spot in a bad situation and made the Star-Advertiser’s second team despite missing the big show. She was part of the long injury list after hurting her back, and didn’t hit the track until begging her way into a relay late in the season.

She made another run at a state title in track and field, and contributed to an ILH team championship with her effort in the 4×100 relay. She ran the 200 meters at the ILH championships but saved her efforts for the relays in her final state event and wrapped up her illustrious career with a second-place finish behind Kaiser in the 4×400 relay.

Lau will take the $2,000 scholarship awarded by Enterprise to the University of Hawaii, where she will play soccer.

Hall of Honor Members