Hawaii rises in softball polls
A 5-1 start to the season gave the University of Hawaii softball team a boost in both national polls released on Tuesday.
The Rainbow Wahine moved up three spots to No. 20 in the USA Today/NFCA Division I Top 25 poll. UH also rose two places to No. 23 in the ESPN.com/USA Softball Collegiate Top 25.
UH won its first five games of the season before losing to No. 18/16 Washington last Saturday.
The Rainbow Wahine departed for Las Vegas on Tuesday morning and open play in the four-day Easton Desert Classic on Thursday. UH faces BYU on Thursday, San Jose State and No. 19/18 UCLA on Friday, No. 7/9 Oregon on Saturday and Utah Valley and Nevada on Sunday.
Alabama was voted No. 1 in the NFCA poll and Oklahoma tops the USA Softball rankings.
Ah Hoy to coach BYU-Hawaii volleyball
Two-time NAIA All-America volleyball player Mona Ah Hoy has been named interim head coach at Brigham Young-Hawaii, replacing the retired Wilfred Navalta.
"I think we have a strong group of players returning, and I think we can be a very good team," said Ah Hoy, who played on two national champion teams with the Seasiders.
Ah Hoy has been Navalta’s top assistant the past four years following a successful stint at Kahuku High School, where she won a state volleyball title in 2002. She helped the Seasiders finish as national runner-up last season.
Hawaii Hilo softball sweeps on the road
Vanessa Salinas tossed a seven-inning no-hitter in the opener, and Ashley Nelson and Hannah Peterson combined on a five-inning, three-hit shutout in the second game as Hawaii Hilo’s softball team swept Cal State East Bay, 6-0 and 11-0, Tuesday in Hayward, Calif.
Kristina Victa was 5-for-7 with four RBIs in the two games for the Vulcans, who improved to 7-5. CSEB is 2-4.
Gosar leads BYU-Hawaii to tri-match win
Freshman Trevor Gosar fired a 2-under-par 70 Tuesday for medalist honors to lead Brigham Young-Hawaii to victory over Hawaii Pacific and Chaminade in a men’s golf tri-match at the Turtle Bay Resort’s Fazio Course.
BYUH totaled 291 to 292 by HPU and 297 by Chaminade. HPU’s Ian Boat and Channing Nueku shot 1-under 71s.
USGA to replace Publinx with new tourneys
The USGA announced Monday it is adding two new national championships — the first additions in more than 25 years — but will end the hugely popular U.S. Amateur Public Links Championships after 2014.
The organization will add U.S. Amateur Four-Ball Championships for women and men. The two-person team tournaments will be played annually in the spring, beginning in 2015. There are no age restrictions and partners do not have to be from the same club, state or country.
Like U.S. Publinx, sectional qualifying will be held around the country, with the top 128 men’s teams and top 64 women’s teams advancing to nationals. The format allows each golfer to play their own ball, with the best score of the team counting. Qualifying is a stroke-play competition and the final 32 teams go to match play.
According to a USGA release, the women’s and men’s Public Links championships are being discontinued after an "internal review which determined that the APL and WAPL championships no longer serve their original mission because of the widespread accessibility public-course golfers today enjoy in USGA championships."
The U.S. Amateur Public Links was first played in 1922 and is the USGA’s fourth-oldest championship. The women’s Publinx was added in 1977. Two years later, the USGA modified entry requirements to allow public-course players to participate in the U.S. Amateur Championships.
Hawaii figures prominently in Publinx history.
Rainbow Wahine coach Lori Castillo won the 1979 and ’80 Women’s Amateur Public Links, and at one time held or shared every individual record.
Michelle Wie became the youngest USGA open champion when she won WAPL in 2003, at age 13. The following year she lost to Yani Tseng in the final. In 2005, Wie became the first female to qualify for the men’s Amateur Public Links national championship, reaching the quarterfinals before losing to the eventual champion.
Punahou freshman Allisen Corpuz is the youngest WAPL competitor, qualifying in 2008 at the age of 10 years, 3 months, 9 days. Former Maui resident Kyung Kim captured last year’s WAPL and Hilo’s Kimberly Kim was runner-up twice. Honolulu won the 2001 team championship.
Charles Barenaba Jr. was the first golfer from Hawaii to win the APL, in 1974. His brother Randy won it the next year, defeating Alan Yamamoto in an all-Hawaii final at Wailua. Yamamoto and David Ishii earned medalist honors that year, with Honolulu taking team honors for the third time. Dean Prince (1978), Guy Yamamoto (1994) and Casey Watabu — who defeated Anthony Kim in 2006 — also captured Publinx national titles.
Northern Arizona tipoff moved up
The tipoff time of the Hawaii-Northern Arizona men’s basketball BracketBusters home game on Feb. 23 has been moved to 5 p.m., UH announced on Tuesday, in order to accommodate the Lumberjacks’ travel schedule.
It is the first time in three years that UH will host a BracketBusters game. UH is 1-3 in those games at the Sheriff and 4-6 overall. It will be the first men’s hoops meeting between UH and Northern Arizona of the Big Sky Conference.