Punahou smothers Moanalua

Penalties cost Punahou’s defense chunks of yardage on Friday. But Buffanblu takeaways fueled a 35-7 season-opening victory over Moanalua.

The third-ranked Buffanblu were flagged for eight pass interference calls among their 14 penalties, with several extending Moanalua drives. But they held the Na Menehune offense out of the end zone and came up with two interceptions, a blocked field-goal attempt and a blocked punt in the second half to feed a 28-point outburst.

“They made a lot of mistakes today, but our kids were resilient,” Punahou coach Kale Ane said. “When they had to rise up they did, which was really great to see.”

Punahou quarterback Stephen Barber completed two of his first 10 pass attempts, then went 12-for-15 to finish with 142 yards and a touchdown. Sitiveni Kaufusi, a 6-foot-3, 225-pound junior, powered the Buffanblu ground attack with 74 yards on 10 carries and two touchdowns.

“Just hit and go low, run the ball and do whatever I can to help the offense,” Kaufusi said. “(I feel) pretty bust up, but you know, I’ll do whatever for my team. It’s all good.”

Aided by Punahou penalties, Moanalua drove inside the Punahou 20-yard line three times and twice reached the Buffanblu 6 only to have the threats end with an interception by Punahou’s Kaulana Makula, a loss on downs to end a 21-play march in the second quarter and a blocked field goal by Tanner Ono early in the third period.

“In terms of competition on paper, it’s a landslide when you think about it like that,” Moanalua coach Savai’i Eselu said of the physical disparity between the teams. “But we want to worry about the things that we can control and not the things that we can’t — their size, their strength. But we need to clean up how we do things internally because we’ve been shooting ourselves in the foot. I don’t know how many times we were in (the red zone), but we just couldn’t punch it in.”

The Buffanblu defense set up their first score of the season when Kennedy Freeman pounced on a fumble at the Moanalua 18. After an incomplete pass, Antonio Cortez Feria took three consecutive handoffs and scored on a 3-yard run.

Punahou took a 7-0 lead into halftime and converted Ono’s block into a nine-play, 73-yard scoring drive capped by Kaufusi’s first touchdown run.

Buffanblu defensive back Marist Liufau came up with an interception and blocked a punt on Moanalua’s next two possessions, with both leading to Punahou touchdowns to put the game out of reach.

Moanalua broke up the shutout in the fourth quarter when Nainoa Decorte scooped up a fumble and scored on a 23-yard return.

Click here to see more photos.