The week ahead lined up like the funkiest schedule in prep football, at least that this sportswriter can remember.
Thursday night at Aloha Stadium, an Interscholastic League of Honolulu opener between Kamehameha and Punahou.
Friday night at pristine Waianae, where Kaiser would make the cross-island trek from Koko Head to Raymond Torii Field.
Saturday, football games at Aloha Stadium for my co-workers. I would be elsewhere. (Don’t ask me where. My brain is too fried, the good-tired after a fun weekend, to recall.)
The effects and potential danger of a possible hurricane flipped the script, and that meant a surreal Sunday morning kickoff at Aloha Stadium for Kaimuki and Faith Lutheran. Sunday morning football, not on the TV, but live. I brought my Vornado fan. Thank God for electrical outlets.
Monday? I took in some JV action, again at Aloha Stadium, before riding out in relaxing Labor Day holiday traffic to Mililani. That’s where Kapolei’s aerial show put on a steady, workmanlike performance.
Not everybody likes football outside of Friday and Saturday night lights. If it were up to some, football would be strictly a day sport. No lights. Just daylight football played on real, natural grass. Hamburgers on the grill, wafting the aroma across the field. That’s football at Hawaii Preparatory Academy in the 1990s. Saturday afternoons, 2 p.m. kickoffs with a guarantee of third-quarter showers from the nearby Kohala Mountains to cool everyone off.
Whether it’s rural football, 11-man, 8-man, private school, public school, school fields, Parks and Recreation fields, synthetic turf in Aloha Stadium or plain old unimproved facilities begging for a makeover (that would be Carlton Weimer Field at Kahuku), we are now in the heart of the season. Four days a week or two, the game is on.
Football as we know it probably won’t be around forever, let alone the next decade or so. We just don’t know. Enjoy it while you can. Now I need to figure out what day this is; this brain refuses to believe it’s Tuesday already. But wait… that means more football in just 72 hours. Nom. Nom. Nom.
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