Mahalo for supporting Honolulu Star-Advertiser. Enjoy this free story!
Hilo’s Tysen Kaniaupio turned in about as complete a game as possible for a goalkeeper Friday.
Kaniaupio made six saves, had an assist and made two more saves during a penalty-kick shootout as No. 3 seed Hilo beat Kaiser 2-1 (4-2 PKs) in the semifinals of the NIU Health Urgent Care/HHSAA Division I Boys Soccer Championships at Radford.
“Tysen is just a pure athlete, football is his main sport,” said Hilo coach George Ichimaru. “We’re blessed to have him on the field. He can kick the ball, he can throw the ball, great movement. All that he did there that’s all his natural athletic ability.”
Hilo (13-1) will play No. 4 seed King Kekaulike in today’s final at 7 p.m. at Radford. Hilo, the BIIF champion, has never won a state title.
In the penalty-kick shootout, the Vikings got conversions from Leha Harman, Michael DeCoito, Kyler Rivera and Ko’ae Pe’a. Hilo’s third shooter, Owen Fragas-Van Blarcom was blocked by Cougars keeper Lucca Tommasino.
Kaiser’s Ian Ngonethong and Sean Caires made their PKs as the Cougars kept pace at 2-2, but Kaniaupio blocked shots by Leo Davies and Richard Yang.
“When I was standing on the line, I was mostly thinking about trusting my gut, trusting what my coaches taught me,” said Kaniaupio, a senior, who played defensive line on the Vikings football team.
Kaniaupio played in the prestigious Polynesian Bowl in January and added he is considering his options to play football at the next level.
Hilo went up 1-0 at 39:24 when Kaniaupio made a save and punted the ball two-thirds of the way down the field to Harman, who fought off a Kaiser defender, touched the ball to the left of Tommasino and shot into the goal.
“The leg strength that I have comes from football originally,” Kaniaupio said. “That punt, I kind of called it before the game because I had a very deep feeling in me that I was going to be able to make that far punt and my player could score.”
The Vikings nearly added to their lead in the 49th, but Harman’s shot from the left side was punched over the crossbar by a leaping Tommasino.
Kaiser (13-2-1) tied it at 1-1 at 57:13 when Ngonethong took a deflected pass from Davies, touched the ball past a defender and shot past Kaniaupio into the right side of the goal.
“Well executed. Pretty perfect, they played it up the middle, made a good pass right over the middle of the defenders and ran onto it and a good finish,” said Kaiser coach Layne Abalos.
The Cougars nearly went ahead in the 66th when Davies took a pass in front of the goal and fired a shot that was deflected by Kaniaupio. The ball spun within inches of the goal line before being cleared by Rivera.
“That got my heart pumping. I just seen it and I just ran to it and kicked it out before it went in,” said Rivera, a senior. “It was just natural.”
In the first 10-minute golden-goal overtime, the Cougars’ Ethan Yang was shoved down from behind just outside the penalty box in the 88th and Ngonethong lined up for the free kick. Ngonethong’s kick went wide right.
Neither team had a shot on goal in the second overtime.
The previous day, Kaiser, the OIA’s fifth-place team, beat No. 2 seed Mililani in PKs.
“If you saw us yesterday, the PKs were perfect, spot on,” Abalos said. “Today, unfortunately we weren’t. We were tired and mentally not focused.”
79
