Maryknoll's Bri Ryan makes contact with a pitch against Kamehameha. Sylvia Lee | SL

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Maryknoll's Shayna Ige winds up to throw to first base against Kamehameha. Sylvia Lee | SL

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Kamehameha's Ateisha Norton heads for third base against Maryknoll. Sylvia Lee | SL

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Kamehameha's Brooke Sauer connects with a pitch against Maryknoll. Sylvia Lee | SL

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SAND ISLAND--In a battle between the top two teams in the ScoringLive/OC16 Softball Power Rankings, top-ranked Kamehameha prevailed over No. 2 Maryknoll, 4-2 at Sand Island Park on Friday afternoon. This game was supposed to be played last week at Central O’ahu Regional Park, but it was rained out. 

“Today we played as a team and we were always practicing as a team, so we play for the person next to us which is good because whenever someone made a mistake we always pick each other up and let each other know that we have each others’ backs if a mistake was made or if something went wrong,” said Kamehameha pitcher Christine Hipa. 

The Warriors improve to 8-1 and remain on top in the Interscholastic League of Honolulu standings while the Lady Spartans fall to 7-2 and saw their seven-game winning streak snapped. Kamehameha beat Maryknoll, 3-2 in the opening game of the season on Mar. 5. 

“Maryknoll is one of the harder teams we faced and it was hard practicing to prepare for them. This is good we beat Maryknoll because they were one of the top teams to beat,” said Hipa. 

Hipa led the way for Kamehameha as she pitched all seven innings and struck out four batters and added a home run in the top of the sixth inning. Ateisha Norton was 2 of 3 with a double and triple and also scored 2 runs as the Warriors had nine hits for the game. 

“She pitched a really good game today, we had eight runners on base today. Normally we score a lot more runs and she held us down and you have to give her a lot of credit,” said Maryknoll coach John Uekawa. 

“What was working was getting two strikes on them early and throwing stuff they would hit hard and high,” said Hipa, on some of her pitches that kept Maryknoll off balanced. 

“We feel we always feel we can compete whoever is on the mound and we know Maryknoll is an awesome team,” said Kamehameha coach Aloha Yamaguchi.

In the top of the second inning, Kaleihoku Kaneshiro hit a single to center field and moved to second on Haley Kodama’s sacrifice bunt. Ateisha Norton hit an RBI triple to right field that scored Kaneshiro and right after that, Jordan Sanchez hit an RBI double to center field to score Norton to give the Warriors a 2-0 lead. 

In the bottom of the third inning, Shayna Ige hit a single to short stop Sanchez, but managed to beat the throw. She moved to second on a passed ball and Shearyna Labasan hit a ground out to Kodama and Ige moved to third. Miki Takara hit an RBI single to bring in Ige for the score. 

In the top of the fifth, Norton hit a double to left field to start things off and moved to third on a passed ball. Katelyn Mahelona hit an RBI single grounder to bring in Norton for her second run of the game. 

The Lady Spartans had opportunities to score and had eight runners left on base for the game. 

In the top of the sixth, after striking out twice in her previous at bats, Hipa broke through and blasted a home run over the left field fence to put the Warriors up, 3-2. 

“I would have to give that to Coach Aina because when I don’t look at the ball or don’t see the ball good, I usually slash and I wasn’t seeing the ball and she told me to slash and it paid off,” said Hipa, on the home run. 

In the bottom of the sixth, Erica Inagaki hit a single past the short stop to lead off. She moved to second on Chynna Mekaru’s sacrifice bunt. Mylee Enos hit it to Kamehameha’s Lia Tom for the second out. Jerae Keli’ikoa hit a single to right field to move Inagaki to third. Paloma Higashi came in for Keli’ikoa. Ige got on first and Inagaki scored on a error by Rachel Dumlao to make it 4-2. However, Labasan hit it to Sanchez who tagged out Higashi as she was running to third base for the third out. 

In the top of the seventh, Labasan caused Sanchez to fly out to right field and Katelyn Mahelona hit a single past second. Ogasawara hit a fly out to centerfield and Labasan struck out Jordan Millwood to end the inning to give the Lady Spartans a chance to tie or win the game in the bottom of the seventh.

However, in the bottom of the seventh, Takara hit it directly to Hipa for the first out and Hipa then caused Soma to fly out to centerfield. Bri Ryan got on after she hit a single to the right field, but Inagaki hit a ground out to Kaneshiro to end the game. 

“She got us out when she had to, the defense played a really good game,” said Uekawa. 

 “We have been working hard defensively and offensively. The thing with our defense we can move people around as well as players play multiple positions, so when they keep their minds strong and have the opportunity to be in there, the main thing is to make those plays and back our pitchers up on defense,” said Yamaguchi. 

Maryknoll will have to put this loss behind them quickly as they play a red-hot Mid-Pacific team (ranked No. 5), that has outscored their opponents 51-10 in their four-game winning streak, tomorrow at 1 pm. 

“We have to mentally prepare for each game every week and there are no gimmes. Mid-Pac is on a hot streak right now and they’re playing really tough. Before we got by and beat them 3-2, then they really started hitting the ball,” said Uekawa. 

Kamehameha will play No. 8 ‘Iolani on Apr. 7 at 4 pm. 

“Definitely a dog fight in the ILH, I go a game-by-game strategy because although we’re playing Maryknoll, Mid-Pacific’s been pretty hot and ‘Iolani is tough so we have them on Monday as well as Mid-Pacific on Wednesday (Apr. 9) so it’s going to be a great week for us. Playing Maryknoll today, we got to move on to the next game after tonight,” said Yamaguchi.