One ball. No bag. One championship.
Kamalanimaile Manner used to have a Hello Kitty bowling bag. Yes, there is such a thing, apparently. But over the days, weeks and years of toting that adorable bag around to junior league at Leeward Bowl, the inevitable happened.
Kamalani’s bowling bag broke.
She decided not to get a new bag. Her mom, Makua Leilani, doted on the youngest of her six children. Get a new bag, she’d insist. She had decked out Kamalani and brother Kekoa with the best gear she could find just a few years earlier.
Baby daughter refused. To this day, the Hanalani sophomore carries her 13-pound ball around with her bare hands, just like she did last week when Manner surprised the world of Interscholastic League of Honolulu bowling by winning the championship.
She didn’t just win a girls title. Her 189-189-202—580 score was better than all the boys as well.
In many ways, Manner is a walking representation of what happens when someone who likes a multitude of sports happens to be really good at bowling. She also is a walking contradiction to a small degree.
“I don’t believe in luck,” said Manner, who has a personal best of 245 during practice.
Yet, she has no idea how she finished first in the ILH, completely oblivious to her teammates’ attention to oil patterns and hand powder and anything to do with the science of the sport. It’s just roll and rip for Manner.
“I know nothing about bowling. Even my coach (Bobbie Yoshimoto) knows that. But I know how to adjust.”
She doesn’t have a name for her roll. She doesn’t call her curve ball a curve ball or anything else.
“Yeah, sure. ‘Curve ball.’ I aim for the head pin and the one on the right,” Manner said.
She’s also one of the more recent examples of what it means to go through concussion protocol. In late August, the same day she competed in her first amateur longboard contest, she suffered a concussion while surfing in Waikiki.
“I was surfing near tourists,” she said. “A guy said sorry to me. I wasn’t sure what why.”
Manner was unable to walk in a straight line, let alone bowl. She went through weeks of physical therapy to regain her balance and fell behind in school, watching her 3.0 grade-point average slip.
She recovered. Then she was horsing around at school, playing football, when she fractured the pinky finger on her right hand. Her release hand. Though she missed just one day of ILH competition, that injury set her back.
Manner needed to perform at her best on the day of the ILH championships to qualify for states. Now that she has, anything could happen when the Billy Tees/HHSAA State Championships are held at her stomping grounds, Leeward Bowl, on Thursday and Friday. A first-year varsity bowler as one of the favorites for a state title. She might retire from the game after this season. Bowling and volleyball are in the same season.
“I miss volleyball, spiking and digging. Next year, I’m going to ask my volleyball and bowling coaches if there’s some way I can work hard over the summer and play both,” she said.
If there were a surfing club on campus, Manner believes she would probably be the only member. She is is subdued and talkative at the same time. But surfing? Her favorite movie, her favorite way to spend time, all about surfing. She may have only one bowling ball, but she has five surfboards.
“I don’t know why everyone has so many balls,” she said.
She began bowling at 9, much like other kids who had mothers and uncles who liked to bowl. For a time, she would bowl with her dad, Keali‘i, but most of the time, mom took her and older brother Kekoa to the alley. It was something to do, like her other activities. Her favorite sports, in order of preference: 1. Longboard surfing, 2. Basketball, 3. Volleyball, 4. Free diving, 5. Skateboarding, 6. Dancing.
Bowling is at the end of that list — No. 7 — and yet she was spinning curves down the lane within a year after she began playing in the Saturday junior league. She just happens to be a queenpin.
Underneath the variety of activities, and maybe spurred by the support of her mom, the one common thread is that Manner loves to compete. She might shun some of the nuances of her activities for sheer fun, but it’s not exactly a casual thing.
“My dad would take me bowling and he would get good scores, so it got competitive,” she said. “I hate losing. I was maybe 10 and scored around 140-ish when I beat him. He was, ‘Oh, finally you beat me.’
There are college bowling scholarships out there, rewards for kids who spend most of their free time at the alley. On a free Sunday, Manner would rather be in the water surfing. One dream is to travel to Tahiti and ride their version of Banzai Pipeline, Teahupo‘o. Manner’s mother worries, of course. Any chance to take a break from the water during this time of year is a good one. It is the time when sharks are in mating season.
“There is an old saying, ‘Pua ka wiliwili nanahu ka mano’ — ‘When the wiliwili tree blooms, the shark bites.’ October and November is wiliwili season,” said Makua Leilani, who is a Hawaiian Studies teacher at Pearl City Highlands Elementary School.
Bowling? Just a wee bit safer.
So Manner will walk into Leeward Bowl, a purple-and-green Freakin’ Frantic ball in hand with a mom who would love to get her another bag, another few balls, maybe some rags and powder. Manner is no frills. She is someone and no one, the Arya Stark and Iron Mike of local prep bowling. Without the baggage, of course. Definitely without the baggage.
BOX OF FAVORITES
KAMALANIMALIE MANNER
>> Hanalani Schools
>> Sophomore
>> Bowling, basketball, volleyball
>> Athlete: John John Florence. “Everything he does is amazing.”
>> Food (at home): “I eat everything. I like my grandma’s spaghetti. (Grandma is Juanita.) I can make spaghetti, pancakes, French toast, bacon omelette. I can microwave saimin.”
>> Food (eating out): “I like sushi and Hawaiian food. Genki Sushi and Highway Inn.”
>> Surfing: “I have five surfboards, short to long.”
>> Free diving: “I usually dive for sand to see how deep I can go. Shark’s Cove. I would love to use a spear gun.”
>> Skateboarding: “I have long boards and short.”
>> Dancing: “I do hula and Tahitian. It used to be weekly since I was 3. I was in Mix Pac (hip hop).”
>> Movie: “Endless Summer.” “I don’t know their names. I skip to the parts where they surf.”
>> TV show: “Grey’s Anatomy.” “It’s just funny and relatable. And I want to become a surgeon. At the time I first started watching this show, I was dissecting animals — pig, squid, shark. Some people went outside (the classroom). Babies. Cardio surgery, the heart, that’s what I want to see.”
>> Music artist: Kolohe Kai. “I enjoy island music.”
>> Teacher: Jesus. “I have a lot of favorites, so I’ll pick Jesus.”
>> Class: Chemistry. “Yeah, it is complicated, but I got around to it. I understand it.”
>> Place to relax: Beach.
>> Motto/scripture: “If you don’t do it now, you’re going to regret it.”
>> What is the history of your name: “My mom was listening to the song ‘Kamalani’ by Israel Kamakawiwo’ole.” Her mom, Makua Leilani, adds: “I was sitting in my classroom during lunch (at Pearl City Highlands Elementary School) having lunch break, listening to music and that song ‘Kamalani’ came on. And she kicked me. I was six months (pregnant). When the kids came in, I was playing ukulele and asked them if they knew the song. They sang along and she was kicking the ukulele.”
>> Earliest memory of bowling: “Started in third grade. I got the hang of it.” Mom adds: “She joined (junior league). My co-worker’s kids bowled in the league. It runs in the family. (Brother) Kekoa bowled for Hanalani. My uncle bowled. Once in a while we bowl as a family.”
>> Gear: Freakin’ Frantic, purple and green, 12 or 13 pounds. “We got it from a Pro-Am package deal at Hickam.”
>> What are you good at that would surprise people: “I can surf and I have a good memory for faces.”
>> Ultimate dream: “Still searching.”
