Eight days ago might as well be last year as far as the Kailua boys basketball team is concerned.

With Wednesday night's upset of fourth-ranked Kalaheo, the Surfriders extended their current winning streak to three games. Not since Jan. 12 — a two-point home loss to Kaimuki — have they tasted defeat.

A little more than a week has made all the difference for this team, which evened its record at 4-4 in the Eastern Division of the Oahu Interscholastic Association.

The victory over the crosstown-rival Mustangs was the best win on Kailua's 14-9 resume this season and its first over a currently ranked team.

"I'm very proud of my guys to come back from 1-4 and now we're 4-4 and playing to where we're supposed to be," Marciel said, a former longtime JV coach and varsity assistant at Kalaheo.

Marciel was overcome with emotion following the win, his first over his former school in his career.

"It's amazing because in all of our years we've never beat Kalaheo and it felt good to get this win, especially for coach," said Kailua junior post Christian Mejia, who had team-highs of 23 points and 10 rebounds Wednesday.

The Surfriders got off to a 7-0 start in the preseason and opened the regular season with a one-point win over Roosevelt — which upset top-ranked Kaiser in overtime Wednesday, by the way. However, they dropped their next four games by a combined 15 points, including three losses by three-or-fewer points.

"We needed this win because all of our other games have been close and we lost to some D2 teams so beating Kalaheo helped us a lot," Mejia said. "Our confidence is getting higher because we're playing together now and we're sharing the ball better and playing as a team."

Marciel's squad rallied from being down five with about four minutes left to play after Kalaheo opened the fourth quarter with an 11-0 run.

When the Mustangs' ball-handling let them down (they committed back-to-back turnovers on pivotal possessions in the final three minutes), the Surfriders seized command by getting to the free-throw line, making five of their final six attempts.

Kailua made 10 of 12 second-half free throws and was 17 of 23 for the game. Meanwhile, Kalaheo was just 8 of 14 from the charity stripe.

Noah Ah Yat's go-ahead jumper in the lane broke a 52-all tie with three seconds left. The Surfriders closed out the game on an 11-3 run.

"We settled the guys down and told them to just believe in what we were working and that they went 11-0, now we're going to make a run," Marciel said. "This game is all about runs and who ends up with the best run at the end is the winner and it showed tonight."

Mejia was a force in the paint. He shot 9 of 11 from the field to score a season high and also notched three steals and two assists — all while handling point duties in Kailua's multiple zone defenses.

"We ran our 1-2-2 (zone), we moved Christian to the top which gives us a little bit of a wider wing span with him," Marciel said. "In the first half we didn't do a very good job with their two scorers — (Captain) Whitlock and (Alex) Layi — (but) in the second half we did a better job. If anybody was going to beat us it wasn't going to be those two guys and that's what we talked about at halftime."

Whitlock finished with a game-high 27 points — 14 of them coming in the final quarter — and Layi netted all but four of his 15 points in the first half.

"We just had to dig deep inside, play with that fire and finish strong," Mejia said.

Ah Yat, who scored a season-high 14 points, said Marciel challenged the Surfriders after Kalaheo took a seemingly-commanding 46-42 lead midway through the fourth quarter after trailing by six at the end of the third.

"Coach called a timeout, we sat down and he told everybody that we've got to be together," Ah Yat said. "That's what we've been saying throughout the year, is "be together," and not trying to take things on our own and go to the hoop every time and just use everybody and everybody can be a weapon on our team."

Kailua will look to make it four in a row against Farrington Friday.