On paper, No. 1 Saint Louis secured a hard-earned 35-28 win over No. 3 Punahou on Saturday night at Aloha Stadium.
In reality, the game turned on the stealth presence and performance of its defense. The injured leader of the ‘D’ didn’t get consistent snaps until halfway through the second quarter. Faatui Tuitele makes that much of a difference, and the Crusaders improved to 4-0 overall, 3-0 in ILH Open play. Punahou dropped to 3-2 in league play (3-2 overall) despite giving the nation’s No. 12 team its toughest battle of the season.
“It was kind of difficult at first, but I was happy for my brothers who were in before me. I love seeing them play and do their thing. I know sometimes they don’t get to play as much. A lot of them got sacks, too,” Tuitele said.
His effect is widespread, and it changed the entire scope of Punahou’s offensive attack.
“Whenever you lose one of our better players, whoever it is, it has a factor in the game. Thank goodness, he was good enough (health wise),” Crusaders coach Cal Lee said. “We wanted to rest him, but we needed him to play. When he’s in there, it’s a different ballgame. We had a week rest and we were hoping he’d recover. There’s no broken bone. It’s stiffness.”
Sitting out most of the first 15 minutes with an undisclosed injury, Tuitele entered the game with his Crusaders trailing upset-minded Punahou 21-14.
He finished with three sacks and the only points Punahou scored after that were on a fourth-quarter drive that Tuitele didn’t play.
Campbell takes first loss
Campbell coach Darren Johnson gave a tongue-in-cheek comparison of fortunes to the University of Hawaii football team as he walked off the field at John Kauinana Stadium.
“They bachi’d us. When they win, we win,” Johnson said of the Rainbow Warriors, who fell by a touchdown at Army earlier Saturday in West Point, N.Y.
And so it was that No. 4 Campbell (4-1, 1-1 OIA Open Division) received a 52-14 beatdown at the hands of an extremely motivated No. 5 Mililani team (4-2, 2-0) coming off a pair of losses going into its homecoming night.
There was just no stopping Mililani quarterback Dillon Gabriel. The West Point-bound senior was 26-for-43 for 371 yards with four touchdowns and no interceptions. He added a rushing score for good measure.
“I think, just this whole week I was laser-focused,” said Gabriel, who was coming off a three-interception, six-sack performance in a 43-21 loss to Punahou, and a loss at national No. 1 St. John Bosco (Calif.) the week before that. “I was disappointed in what I did the past week. But I talked with Coach (Rod York) we had a great talk. The thing is, you can’t dwell on the past. You really gotta be short-term memory, you just gotta forget about it. This week I came out super focused and I think the whole team did.”
Makekau makes history
‘Iolani football has always been about “One Team.”
On Saturday night, running back Kaua Nishigaya and place-kicker Mika Makekau reached new heights, and their success led ‘Iolani (4-2, 3-1 ILH Division I) to a tough 30-19 win over Damien (3-2, 3-1) at Aloha Stadium.
Makekau continued to rise to her enormous potential. She drilled three field goals, including a 44-yard blast that is the longest made by a girl in Hawaii high school history. The national mark is 48 yards.
“It’s because of my team. It’s a combined effort,” Makekau said. “I couldn’t do it without my holder. I just stare at the tee. I only have one vision. It’s my job. I’ve got to do it.”
Moanalua leads OIA D-I
Not a single Moanalua fan could be blamed if the thought of a low-scoring game brought shivers to the spine.
After all, surging Moanalua had scored 40, 38 and 42 points in OIA Division I play so far, racking up a 3-0 mark heading into a showdown at Leilehua on Friday night.
The ninth-ranked Mules had extra incentive on homecoming night. Moanalua (4-0 overall and OIA D-I) got defensive, limiting Leilehua’s normally potent offense to 199 total yards, including minus-5 on the ground, in a stunning 23-10 victory.
Tupu Alualu, one of many playmakers on the defensive side, was a force with 1.5 sacks. Moanalua had three takedowns of Leilehua’s dangerous quarterback, Max Nichols, by halftime.
“Our defensive coach and offensive coach made us run a lot more this week,” said Alualu, who was the defensive line MVP at the GPA Combine last June.
Nichols was held to 204 passing yards (17-for-34) with one TD and a late interception for Leilehua (4-2, 3-1).
Castle has its QB
It took a little while, but Castle is set at quarterback.
The Knights — who lost their first four games of the season, three in OIA Division I play — have new life behind the new guy taking snaps. With running back Senituli Punivai converted to quarterback, Castle has wins over Nanakuli (22-9) last week and Radford (45-33) Friday night.
The 45 points the Knights (2-4, 2-3 OIA D-I) hung on the Rams were their most since a 49-35 outburst at Nanakuli last September, when Jaylen Uyemura-Lee was at the controls.
Punivai, a 5-foot-11 senior who’s also played cornerback, was a very potent dual threat for coach John Hao. He showed his propensity to run (26 carries, 151 yards, TD) with a largely untapped ability to throw (8-for-14, 182 yards, four TDs, INT) on homecoming night against Radford.
The 151 rushing yards were good for 10th place on Castle’s all-time list.
“I feel a little bit better that our team is actually playing together now. We got a guy who’s willing to make plays on offense as the quarterback,” Hao said. “Tuli has done a great job of just leading (with) what we’ve been missing forever.”
He’s making throws when we’ve been asking for them. Guys who’ve been catching it have been open. So, as long as our offense can move the chains and score, it helps our defense out. Our defense plays hard no matter what. Our offense does too, we’ve just been slacking in one area, which is our quarterback.”
This week
Two top-five teams clash in Ewa Beach on Saturday night when Campbell hosts Punahou.
But the biggest game on tap could be in Division II when undefeated St. Francis (5-0, 4-0 ILH) plays Kaimuki (4-1, 4-0 OIA) at Skippa Diaz Stadium on Saturday.
The Bulldogs and Saints are the only two D-II teams on Oahu who have outscored their five opponents by more than 100 points this season.
Kaimuki is averaging 32.5 points per game in its four OIA D-II wins while St. Francis is averaging 41.0 points against D-II opponents.
