Kailua hangs on to upend ninth ranked Leilehua

Brian Bautista | SL

Kailua took control early, then held on down the stretch, getting a game-sealing intercetption by Rusty Whitlock to preserve a 33-30 win over Leilehua, the first of the season for the Surfriders.

The win for Kailua snapped a three-game losing streak, two to ranked Hawaii opponents and the other a high scoring affair up in Las Vegas.

Romeo Ortiz factored into a pair of scores, passing for 90 yards and a touchdown and rushing for 89 more, 29 yards of that total coming on Kailua's final scoring play.

Things looked to be well at hand for the Surfriders, as a 13 point halftime lead became a 27-7 advantage within minutes of the start of the third quarter when Benjamin Honebein leaped up and snatched a pass attempt by the Mules and ran it back 35 yards for a pick-six.

But Leilehua rallied behind the arm of Bennett Strobel and the legs of Cameron Keeve, scoring a pair of fourth quarter touchdowns with two-point conversions to get within a field goal of tying things up.

Strobel completed 22 of 41 passes for 292 yards and four touchdowns, one of those to Keeve in the early going that went for 87 yards. Speaking of Keeve, he was a workhorse, toting the ball 30 times for a game-high 149 yards.

Kailua's Aizek Kaanoi led all pass catchers 100 yards with Leilehua's Talon Tarpley close behind with a game-high 10 grabs for 98, including a 30 yard scoring play late in the fourth to give the Mules a chance.

Defensively Dougie Kalama was a force for the Surfriders, registering four total tackles, two sacks and two passes defended, as was Honebein, who added a scak, a forced fumble and the aforementioned pick-six.

For Leilehua, Gabriel Liua had a game-high 11 tackles, 2 1/2 for loss, and Ruiz Makuakai added six more tackles, two of them for losses.