No. 8 Cougars ‘adapt or die’

Just before beginning his second fall camp as Kaiser football coach, Cameron Higgins had to call an audible.

The former Saint Louis and Weber State quarterback was caught off guard when junior Justin Uahinui, groomed all year to be the Cougars’ starter at QB, transferred to Farrington a week before classes begin on Friday.

With less than two weeks until the season opener at Kapolei on Aug. 7, the Cougars put on pads Monday and began to change their entire offensive scheme as they cope with the loss of Uahinui.

“You’ve just got to adapt or die. That’s basically our motto,” Higgins said. “We’ll change up our offensive look to accommodate for our new personnel.”

Ranked No. 8 in the Star-Advertiser preseason Top 10, which was voted on before Uahinui decided to transfer, the Cougars have a lot of work to do to live up to that billing.

Safety Nic Tom, who played primarily on defense as a junior, will double as the team’s starting quarterback with Kainoa Torres, up from the junior varsity team, and linebacker Parker Higgins also taking practice snaps behind center.

Tom has never thrown a pass at the varsity level, but worked as the emergency quarterback during the spring and summer, and is ready for the challenge.

“I’m excited to be on the field more. I like it,” Tom said. “It’s going to be tiring. We don’t have much depth and a lot of guys are going to go both ways so we want to be up-tempo but we have to base the tempo based on how we’re feeling.”

Higgins, who took over last season for Rich Miano after the Cougars won the Division II state title in 2013, went 5-4 overall in his rookie season, losing to Mililani in the OIA quarterfinals.

The Cougars scored a memorable upset of Kahuku, beating the Red Raiders for the first time since 1989 last season, but also had their season-opening win against Aiea taken away because of an ineligible player.

Higgins preached a fast pace on offense that he believes caught up to the Cougars late in the season, when Kaiser survived a 54-48 first-round OIA playoff victory against Moanalua before getting beat by Mililani, 54-14.

“Hindsight is 20-20 but there are definitely things I could’ve done better,” Higgins said. “I’ve got to keep these guys healthy and fresh for a longer season than I expected. When we played Mililani in the playoffs we were just dead. We had no legs, no gas, and I think we were mentally and physically drained so the strategy is definitely to save our kids’ legs as much as possible, especially since we’ve got so many kids playing both ways.”

Kaiser returns running back Jensen McDaniel, who rushed for 1,135 yards and 21 touchdowns as a junior, to carry the load on offense. He’ll have a strong offensive line to run behind, featuring the top high school prospect in the state, 6-foot-4, 302-pound Michael Eletise, who committed to Arizona on Monday.

“This guy can move people out of the way. It doesn’t matter who it is,” McDaniel said pointing to Eletise at practice on Monday. “(We’re looking to accomplish) bigger things. We always want to do bigger and better things. You don’t ever want to stay the same.”

Eletise, who is ranked by Scout.com as the best senior offensive guard in the West region, said it will be an adjustment changing quarterbacks this close to the season opener.

“Justin told me he might transfer and you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do for yourself,” Eletise said. “He didn’t tell me until after he transferred so I was kind of hurt because he was my quarterback. We’ve practiced every down together and we’ve always been with each other and have meshed as a squad together so it kind of throws things us off a bit, but (Tom) is an athlete, he can play every position, and I’m not at all worried about our situation.”