ILH Boys Basketball
No. 4 Maryknoll topples No. 2 Punahou, 50-46


  



Fri, Jan 27, 2017 @ Maryknoll


Final 1 2 3 4  
Punahou (11-3, 26-6) 4 16141246
Maryknoll (8-4, 21-6) 14 12 15 950
I. Gelacio 11 pts  3 3pm
C. Kobayashi 24 pts  6 3pm
K. Ferreira 6 tot  1 off  5 def
K. Makaula 6 tot  2 off  4 def
I. Gelacio 4 ast
C. Mausolf 4 ast

MAKIKI — No. 4 Maryknoll hit eight 3-pointers and withstood a late rally to beat No. 2 Punahou, 50-46 in a Interscholastic League of Honolulu regular season game at the Tony Selitto Court at Clarence T.C. Ching Gymnasium on Friday.

The Spartans avenge their only loss and snap the Buffanblu's seven-game winning streak on senior night to improve to 7-1 and move into first place in the ILH standings. Maryknoll ends the regular season on the road at Saint Louis (1-7) and Iolani (6-2). Punahou closes the regular season by hosting Mid-Pacific (1-7).

"The only thing we can control is our next game. We have to rest up and hope to come out on Tuesday with a ‘W'", said Punahou coach Darren Matsuda.

"It's great. Beating them means a little bit more, especially on senior night," said senior Kaulana Schmidt.

Punahou had a grueling week by playing four games in six days and the fatigue showed at the free throw line as the team finished 4-for-15.

"I think it had to do with our shots. We were short on everything. We are a good free throw shooting team usually, I think today that costed us the game in a lot of ways," said Matsuda.

Punahou got the score within three, 49-46 with 39.6 seconds left after Chris Kobayashi hit his sixth 3-pointer of the game and he finished with 24 points. Each team took turns missing free throws—Jordyn Perez went to the line, but missed the one-and-one free throw and Kobayashi was fouled with 19.5 seconds left, but he missed.

"If you have Chris at the free throw line a hundred times, he's probably going to make that shot 99 times, but just so happened tonight was that one time he missed," said Maryknoll coach Kelly Grant, on Kobayashi.

Kaulana Schmidt (11 points) hit 1-of-2 free throws to push the lead to four, 50-46 with 18.2 seconds left. Punahou had the last shot as Zayne Chong launched a deep 3, but as Maninoa Tufono grabbed the board, he stepped out of bounds while chucking up a desperation shot with 0.7 seconds left.

"Last year we had a hard time winning close games. We matured as a team and came together this year and started playing," said Schmidt.

Despite the misses late in the game and finishing 8-for-18, Maryknoll has been one of the state's most improved free throw shooting teams.

"Last year we were a 51 percent free throw shooting team. I told the team they have to shoot meaningful shots. Kids really focused on shooting correctly," said Grant.

Both teams combined for 16 3-pointers—each team hit eight for the game.

"Third quarter we were stagnant. Overall the whole game, I thought we moved pretty well," said Grant.

The Spartans raced out to an 8-0 lead after a 3-pointer from Kainoa Ferreira and Punahou called timeout at 3:54. Maryknoll hit three 3's in the quarter and Daven Pila's 3 from the right wing beat the buzzer to give the Spartans a 10 point lead, 14-4.

"You have to give those guys a hand. Those guys came out and on senior night shot the hell out of the ball. They were focused and ready to play this game and deserved it," said Matsuda.

"I told the kids during the pregame warmup to relish this and this will probably be the biggest game you'll play so far. I wanted them to relish that they were playing for first place," said Grant.

Kobayashi heated up to score 10 points to rally the Buffanblu to start the second quarter. His second 3-pointer brought Punahou within three, 17-14 and he scored 13 of the 16 quarter points. Isiah Gelacio and Payton Grant each made 3-pointers to give Maryknoll a 26-20 lead at halftime.

"We made some changes and coming into today's game we needed to change our sequences. In the past, Punahou would know where we are and we had to make changes and it made a difference," said Grant.

A 3-pointer and baseline jumper from Schmidt gave Maryknoll a 31-20 lead to start the third quarter. Kobayashi kept Punahou in it with 3's and Zayne Chong's 3-pointer and Cole Mausolf's layup brought it within seven, 41-34 to end the third.

The Buffanblu closed the gap to three, 41-38 after Chong's jumper, but Gelacio made his third 3-pointer of the game to finish with 11 points, pushed it to 44-38. Kobayashi's runner pulled Punahou within two, 45-43 with under 3 minutes left. Jaylen Cain made a putback plus the foul, but failed to convert the 3-point play and Makoto Kamata made two free throws to make it, 49-43 with a minute left in the fourth quarter.

"Despite the bad shooting night, we kept fighting and that's all you can ask," said Matsuda.



Reach Brandon Ching at [email protected].




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