St. John Bosco football coach Jason Negro was in the Turtle Bay Resort lobby on the way out to practice on the property Thursday when he was approached by Kahuku co-athletic director Wendy Anae.
“She said, ‘We’d love to play you in a two-year deal,’ ” Negro said.
They exchanged contact numbers and there could be more talks.
“That is certainly a possibility,” Negro said about playing against the Red Raiders in a two-game home-and-home series. “We would love to be able to play at their place. That’s what I’m excited about on Saturday night. We’re playing at Mililani, not the stadium. It’s going to mean a lot to their community to have our kids play on their campus.”
St. John Bosco’s Braves (No. 2 in the MaxPreps Xcellent 25) of Bellflower, Calif., came to Hawaii once before, a 63-14 victory over Saint Louis in 2014. They’re here preparing to play the Trojans, who are No. 2 in the Honolulu Star-Advertiser’s statewide poll.
“I would love to play in front of that crazy Red Raider nation,” Negro added. “We’re always looking for opportunities to challenge our student-athletes and there wouldn’t be anything bigger than to play them in their house.”
But Negro isn’t looking past Mililani in any fashion.
“Coach (Rod) York and his staff do a great job coaching,” he said. “They play really good defense and I’ve seen that they’re not giving up a whole lot. Their running back (Malosi Sam) is one of the top kids we’ve seen all year — his ability and how hard he runs.
“And we’re playing at Mililani. It’s not going to be easy. I heard the weather may be funky. And high school kids drive off of momentum. That’s the biggest scare for me. If the crowd is getting into it and they get some positive things going early in the game, it’s gonna be a game. They’re going to give us everything we can handle and we are not taking them lightly. We know we’re not coming over here with a huge advantage. We’re 4-0. They’re 6-0. It’s going to be a great game.”
Negro talked about the national perspective, which is more pronounced now than ever.
“I have a tremendous amount of respect for schools across the states who step up in competition and challenge their athletes. And nobody does it better than Hawaii. Maybe Utah is a close second and Vegas in third, maybe. What Hawaii does with Punahou and Kamehameha, Saint Louis, Kahuku, Mililani — those guys step up and play the competition from the mainland year in and year out. It says a whole lot not only about the culture as a whole, as a people, but also you’ve got to give the school administrations, the coaching staff, families and communities credit to make the sacrifices to make this happen. They want to be seen, and as a result Mililani is No. 22 and Saint Louis is in the Top 10. They’re doing something right here. We are very appreciative of the willingness to play us. It means a lot to me.”
Negro also called out to Texas, hoping to get the Lone Star state teams more interested in traveling and not just hosting out-of-state national powers.
“Texas is very interesting,” he said. “They seem to be leery of traveling. They blame the districts or blame this and that or that they have such big programs that they can’t travel. If you can build $60 million stadiums, you can travel your team in Austin to come and play in Bellflower. I don’t buy the excuses. They need to step up and travel like the rest of us if they want to be mentioned with the rest of the national programs. We’ve been to Cincinnati, New Jersey, DC, Florida, Hawaii twice and Utah. We’ve been all over the place.”
Go rep for the state Trojans. Good luck to both teams. Take the nation by surprise. Pull off the biggest upset ever in the state.
ST LOUIS vs BOSCO
That would be a hell of a game!
I like Mililani, but sorry trojans. You guys going get smashed tomorrow.
Prediction: MHS 21 SJB 62
Kahuku please stop lol
Good luck Mililani. Most of the 808 will be cheering for you to pull off the upset.
At Simple Simon. Aim high Kahuku. Thats the only way we get the kids back from leaving for “greener pastures” in state or out of state. Lets keep a coaching staff (OK Admin?) so that we can build a program with stability. If we had kept Siuaki, he wouldve surpassed 300 wins by now. Not that wins are the most important things but that helps keep our kids home where most of them want to be and their parents arenʻt so anxious to get them out. And also….enough drama. Its just a game and lets keep as such. Keep it fun.
GO BIG RED.
Simple Simon – Ufa
So Kahuku has a “co-athletic director”?? Okay? Why? It’s a small school. I’m a fan, but you cannot play top 5 schools with a little league coach.
Keeping it real – yeah, but too bad St Louis doesn’t want to get over their “we don’t travel” policy. Can’t schedule a home and home series if you play all your games only in Hawaii.
That would be a great match up.
Hopefully the lights work.
Or else………………. Quitsville.
FeastMode – SJB will be more than willing to come back to Oahu and play them! STL is so over rated and someone needs to serve them a piece of humble pie.
Good Luck yo Mililani!
Ideally, St. Louis would be a great match up on history & talent alone.
Kahuku would be great too. This could be a right direction in their program and hopefully keep local boys in Kahuku. Playing Bosco would provide exposure and I can GUARANTEE Kahuku fans would pack the house in So-Cal for this game.
Kudos to Wendy Anae for reaching out…homegrown girl.
Sending some well wishes to the Trojans.. rep the 808, block out the noise and believe in yourselves!..Looking forward to Kahuku having a crack. Talented group coming up from JV will have 2 opportunities against some of the very best. Let’s do this!!!
Hope Mililani and Bosco play a hell of a game. Thanks Wendy Anae for reaching out to a top ranked High School Team in the Nation.
Hopefully, good things will happen for both Kahuku and Bosco in the near future.
STL Needs to travel to Bosco like Bosco traveled here to play them!
Stop hiding behind the “ Kalaepohaku travel Ban”
That incident was over 20 years ago, get over it..
John Bosco is a win-at-all-costs high school football program. Just like the St Louis Crusaders. Teams should not feed the beast, don’t schedule win-at-all-costs high school football programs that destroy the competitive balance of their respective leagues.
When you can compete against a 50 man coaching squad (coach,staff,trainers,strength coach,speed coach etc.,) then yes. That and booster $$$. Catholic school nationwide are spending millions $$$ on football programs.
True to the good story guy. Watch the JV highlights on YouTube. They look goooood. That passing game, play calling looks good too. To the future. RR4L
Hopefully nobody goes and pillage our kids.Haha. Greener pastures. Best wishes if so. But that JV QB looks legit. Good WRs too.
This is how real football is played. you play anybody any time any where. cal lee rips on sacred hearts but he ducks all games on the mainland
Red Raiders got the match up 3 years later. Sept 17 2022. Don’t know if it’s official but it is certainly going to happen this season.