Pearl City is right in the middle of the pack of Oahu Interscholastic Association West softball.
At 4-4, the Chargers have four convincing wins over the bottom feeders and four losses to the contenders. Two of those four losses were by scores of 5-3 against Kapolei and 2-1 against Mililani. Both of those opponents are ranked in the Honolulu Star-Advertiser’s Top 10.
The game against the Trojans last week was oh-so-close.
Pearl City pitcher Tyanna Kaaialii had a no-hitter going through five innings and ended up losing to Mililani’s Aubree Kim, who finished with a one-hitter.
After taking a 1-0 lead in the sixth, Mililani tied it in the bottom of the sixth and won it in the seventh. Both Trojans runners crossed the plate by a second before catcher Hailey-Alexis Yamaguchi could apply a tag.
“This is not our peak,” said Kaaialii, who wound up with a four-hitter. “We’re just going to keep getting better. We’ll take the wins, take the losses and go straight to the OIAs and do our best. The team definitely sees that we can compete with teams like Mililani and Campbell (the top-ranked team who the Chargers lost to by a 10-5 score). Our game is being stepped up and we need to step it up even more so that we can show teams that we can win.”
A year ago, the Chargers made it to the state tournament, where they lost 8-3 to Marykoll in the first round. The Spartans were eventually eliminated 3-2 by Mililani in the semifinals.
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