Sometimes inspiration comes from places you don’t expect.
Take the Farrington football team for instance. The Governors (1-0) had just beaten Waipahu 46-6 in an Oahu Interscholastic Association game Saturday night, and standout running back Challen Faamatau spoke with Hawaii Prep World about this kind of thing.
Faamatau had just rushed for 102 yards and added 118 receiving yards. Sure, he was feeling good with his OC-16 player of the game plaque in his hands. But he was all pumped up about the other side of the ball, the Farrington defense, which had just held the Marauders to 195 yards of offense.
The inspiration? Part of it, believe it or not, came from OIA Blue rival Mililani.
“They were swarming to the ball and gang-tackling,” Faamatau said about Farrington’s defense after the win over Waipahu. “(Defensive back) Andrew Aneki came to the locker one day and showed a newspaper photo to everyone. He asked, ‘What are they doing in this photo?’ Some guys said, ‘Gang tackling,’ so Andrew told us straight up, ‘That’s what we need to do.’ ”
The photo by the Honolulu Star-Advertiser’s Bruce Asato ran in the Aug. 9 sports section with Paul Honda‘s story about the Saint Louis at Mililani scrimmage. It shows Crusaders junior quarterback Tua Tagovailoa going down at the hands of four Trojans tacklers.
Faamatau is a junior who was part of a strong 1-2 punch with Honolulu Star-Advertiser All-State first-teamer Ranan Mamiya a year ago. This season, instead of the speedy and elusive Mamiya, who graduated, in the backfield, it’s bruising 5-foot-9, 264-pound junior Freedom Alualu. Against the Marauders, Alualu went mostly up the middle for 96 yards.
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