McKinley's Talamoa at peace on field

By Stacy Kaneshiro
Advertiser Staff Writer

There was a time when Jacob Talamoa defied authority, got into fights and belonged to a gang.

Jacob Talamoa is a three-year starter on the defensive line. Cory Lum • The Honolulu Advertiser

"Football saved him," McKinley coach David Tanuvasa said of his third-year starting defensive lineman.

Talamoa is part of the reason the Tigers are enjoying their most successful season ever. They are a win away from advancing to the title game of the Chevron State Football Championships. They will play O'ahu Interscholastic Association champion Castle in an 8 p.m. semifinal Friday at Aloha Stadium.

Tanuvasa is pleased to see Talamoa making trouble for other teams' offenses, instead of committing criminal offenses. As a youngster, Talamoa was a poster child for juvenile delinquency. Growing up in the Lanakila section of Honolulu, Talamoa said he was pulled into gang activity.

"Trouble just comes," Talamoa said. "I'd just fight. I was following my cousin them, so I was following what they did."

One needed a rap sheet to follow Talamoa. He said fights with other students and confrontations with teachers and principals forced him to change elementary schools. The same problems had him shuttling between Kalakaua and Dole intermediate schools — twice. One fight eventually landed him at the Koolau Boys Home for three months during the summer after eighth grade. At 14, Talamoa said he was assigned a probation officer.

"My parents put me straight," he said. "They said, 'If you continue to do this, we'll put you back in (the detention home.' I said, 'OK.' I passed eighth grade and came out for ninth grade."

Talamoa shakes his head with disbelief at his past. When he recalls why he got into so much trouble, he realizes how foolish he was.

"I just wanted to show (people that) I was somebody," he said. "(It was) just showing off."

Tanuvasa said Talamoa's parents warned him of their child's checkered past. They had hoped football was the answer. It worked for his older brother, Willie, who graduated in June and now plays defensive line at Dixie junior college in Utah. His father, Pamo Taumua, also was a defensive lineman for Farrington.

"They let me know about some things he's been dealing with and going through, so I tried to work with that," Tanuvasa said. "We've invited him to family functions, where you don't have to swear, where you have to be polite, where you can give to others. That worked well."

As a freshman on the junior varsity, some of Talamoa's past still haunted him. Talamoa said he would start fights with teammates. Tanuvasa cooled him down with extra running, he said.

"Coach Tanuvasa, he helped me a lot, set me straight," Talamoa said. "He stayed there for me and helped me a lot."

Talamoa reciprocated his coach's belief in him by his sophomore year, when he was promoted to varsity and earned a starting spot on the defensive line.

"I noticed the turnaround in the beginning of his sophomore year, when he started showing up for weight training, study halls," Tanuvasa said. "He wasn't making trouble any more. He looked different."

If it wasn't for sports — he also wrestles and participates in track and field — Talamoa said he would still be doing what he did earlier in his life.

"I'd be on the streets, doing my old thing," he said. "Just making trouble where ever I go."

Tanuvasa is happy Talamoa had an alternative.

"I'm glad he had something he could trust in and take it from there," Tanuvasa said. "He's believed in something, made some goals for himself, all for football and he's become a better person. He's also learned that football isn't the real reason why he should be doing better. It's just family and education. The really important things take over now."

Notes: Talamoa said he and his brother, Willie, take the Talamoa name from their grandparents. His sister, Keri Ann, a junior at McKinley, goes by the Taumua name.