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It took nearly three hours after the 7 p.m. scheduled start time for Kapolei and Mililani to finally take the field in the OIA Division I softball championship on Saturday night.
Less than 10 minutes later, Kapolei had its first two runs and the rest was all up to junior right-hander Jerzie Liana.
Liana tossed a three-hit shutout and Moani Ioane added a two-run homer for good measure as the Hurricanes won their first league title since 2016 with a 5-0 victory over Mililani at Rainbow Wahine Softball Stadium.
Liana struck out five and allowed only one runner to reach scoring position in a dominant outing that took only 1 hour, 58 minutes. The game ended at 11:51 p.m. after the Division II title game before it took nearly four hours.
“It was definitely a long wait. It was difficult trying to see when to warm up,” Liana said after raising her record to 9-1 season.
Kapolei (10-2) finished a game behind the Trojans (10-2) in the regular season after splitting the first two meetings.
Liana is the only pitcher to beat Mililani this season after also earning the win in the regular-season opener for both teams back in March.
“I was really hitting my spots and my spins were working today,” Liana said just a day after pitching Kapolei to a victory over two-time defending OIA champion Campbell. “Yesterday I pitched a whole lot and to come back today it feels good.”
Interim head coach Enson Queypo tried to keep his team loose as they waited through the rain for the end of Waipahu’s 21-14 victory over Nanakuli that included two short weather delays.
When the Division I final finally got underway, the Hurricanes took advantage of three Trojans errors to score twice in the top of the first. Ioane’s RBI single to left resulted in two runs to score after the throw home bounced away from the catcher.
Once those two runs were on the board before his pitcher took the mound, Queypo was confident it would be a good night.
“I felt comfortable because I thought two runs would be enough with Jersey on the mound because she’s been proving she don’t need much runs to win a game,” Queypo said. “With the two runs I felt pretty good already because she’s been stellar the whole season.”
Liana issued a two-out walk in the first inning and gave up a one-out single to Mililani’s Kaui Garcia in the bottom of the second.
Liana retired 15 of the next 16 batters after Garcia’s single before Jackie Kirkpatrick’s one-out single in the bottom of the seventh.
A grounder to first allowed the runner to reach second giving Mililani its first player in scoring position. It didn’t even last a minute as Liana quickly got the fly ball to right to end it.
“We were going to ride her all the way and it seemed like she got stronger and stronger and stronger through the tournament,” Queypo said. “To me, she’s the best pitcher in the state, hands down. I think she proved that the last three days.”
Kapolei maintained a 2-0 lead until the top of the fifth inning. One of five Trojans errors allowed the leadoff batter to reach base before Ioane smoked a line-drive home run that skipped off the top of the fence in left-center for a two-run homer.
“I think I need to go back to the weight room because I’ve been slacking,” Ioane said. “I just wanted to make contact with the ball because my first at-bat I popped up. I had to let that go and refocus.”
Majesty Moisa, who entered the game as a defensive replacement at first base, added an RBI double for the final margin.
Kapolei earned the OIA’s seeded berth into the state tournament which begins a week from Monday.
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Kapolei 5, Mililani 0
WP—Jerzie Liana. LP—Ashley Ogata.
Leading hitters—Kapo: Liana 2-4, run; Puakea Milbourne 2 runs; Moani Ioane 2-4, HR, 3 RBIs; Majesty Moisa 2b, RBI.
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