Kaiser's Chase Kalaugher celebrates after defeating Kalani to win the OIA White title. Greg Yamamoto | SL

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Kalani's Brandon Roberts puts up a shot in traffic against Kaiser. Greg Yamamoto | SL

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Kaiser's Tarius Hill drives to the basket against Kalani. Peter Caldwell | SL

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Kalani's Jaron Yamauchi heads to the basket for a shot attempt against Kalani. Greg Yamamoto | SL

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Kaiser's Chance Kalaugher puts up a jump shot against Kalani. Greg Yamamoto | SL

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Thu, Feb 13, 2014 @ McKinley

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Kaiser

54

Kalani

49

Final	1	2	3	4
Kaiser (5-6, 16-12)	17	8	14	15	54
Kalani (5-6, 12-16)	4	20	9	16	49

• Points
• Rebounds
• Assists

B. Roberts 11 pts  3 3pm  2/2 FTs

C. Kalaugher 16 pts  4/11 FTs

A. Faumui 10 tot  2 off  8 def

C. Kalaugher 13 tot  8 off  5 def

J. Yamauchi 2 ast

K. Lewis II 2 ast

Kaiser (8-6) held off Kalani (6-7) late in the fourth quarter to claim their first O'ahu Interscholastic Association White Championship at McKinley's Student Council Gymnasium on Thursday night. Kalani edged out the Cougars at Kaiser in their previous meeting, 51-49 on Feb. 1. Both teams are from the OIA White East and punched their ticket to the State Tournament. 

"It's been something we worked towards since day one and this is all the credit to the boys and persevered through all these ups and downs. At the end of the day, they made plays and got it done. I told the guys all along that winning is a product of the process. I stressed to them that we're building a foundation and for the guys that stuck it out, I am proud because it feels like they're buying in and they are happy for each others' successes. I stressed to the kids and staff to be resilient. This wouldn't be possible without my assistants who had great input and helped the entire team along the way. It's just a total team effort from the coaching staff, players, managers, the parents, it's just a team effort all around," said Kaiser coach Branden Kawazoe, in his first season as Kaiser's head coach. 

The 6-foot-5 Chance Kalaugher led Kaiser with 16 points and 13 rebounds and 6-foot-4 Matt Haili added 13 points and 10 rebounds. With the size advantage, Kaiser outrebounded Kalani, 45-26. 

Kaiser used their big men early as Chance Kalaugher and Matt Haili led the way to put the Cougars up 17-4.  Haili scored nine of his 13 points in the quarter. The Cougars outrebounded the Falcons 18-2 in the first quarter, nine of those rebounds were offensive rebounds. Kalani shot 1 of 9 from the field and Brandon Roberts' 3-pointer was their only made field goal of the quarter. 

"In the first quarter, our goal was to control the paint. Brandon Roberts and Cory Mitchell are two great players and if we could make it a little harder for them, we'd give ourselves a good chance. This is a pattern that we're trying to find out and we've been stressing is that we have to stay solid possession by possession, never too high and never too low. We were up 17-4 Kalani is a good team they came back on a run," said Kawazoe.

In the second quarter, Kalani battled back and rallied. They went on a 12-2 run to make it 21-16 after Blaise Manabe's layup. The Cougars had four players, three of them starters, who picked up three fouls each. Kalani cut the deficit to one after Cory Mitchell drained both free throws to make it 25-24. Kalani outscored Kaiser 20-8 in the second quarter. 

"I know we'll always battle back and we've been in that situation a lot and I know that the players believe that we'll come back every single time and we've been up and lost leads and went both ways," said Kalani coach Nathan Davis. 

In the third quarter, Kalani took the lead after Roberts hit a 3-pointer near the top, 31-29 to give the Falcons their second lead of the game. Kalaugher drew the foul on David Faletoi and converted the 3-point play to put the Cougars up 34-33. Kaiser used a 5-0 run to end the quarter to take a 39-33 going into the fourth quarter. 

In the fourth quarter, Kaiser pushed the lead to as much as 10 after Roberts tried to save the ball under his own basket and Isaac Slade-Matautia stole the ball for the layup to make it 48-38. 

"When a teammate goes down, other guys have been stepping up and picking up the slack and Isaac Slade-Matautia, my freshman, who missed a bunch of games but he played outstanding in the second half and it's because of his play that we were able to sustain the lead and build it. But that's the nature of our team and fortunately enough we were able to put together a complete game with guys in foul trouble and they continued to battle. The one thing you can never question is their heart and how hard they play," said Kawazoe. 

There was no quit in Kalani as they cut the deficit to four with under 50 seconds remaining after a field goal in the paint by Ace Faumui to make it 53-49. Kalani got the ball back with 24 seconds after a Kaiser turnover, but they could not convert their 3-point attempts as they went 1 of 9 for the quarter. Matt Haili went 1 of 4 from the free throw line to ice the game. 

"I can't argue about that," said Davis on the missed shots down the stretch. "We try our best to get the ball in key players' hands to get them shots that they normally make sometimes they dropped, sometimes they didn't. Good job by Kaiser tonight, they're a well-coached team and they worked hard and earned it."

"In the past couple games we've been grinding it out and fortunately enough we were able to get up 10 in the fourth quarter, we didn't execute well, but everything leading up to that gave us an opportunity even though we didn't do too well in the last couple minutes," said Kawazoe. 

Kalani and Kaiser both clinch state tournament berths to the Hawaiian Airlines Division II Boys Basketball State Championships starting next week. 

"We've been in 10 games decided by four points or less and a lot of those we could've come out on the victorious side. I hope this makes us hungrier, we get a second chance to do something great, said Davis. 

Brandon Roberts led Kalani with 11 points on 3-of-9 shooting from the 3-point line and Jaron Yamauchi added 10 points and Ace Faumui had 10 rebounds.