Saint Louis tops Kaimuki in an epic battle, 47-45
By Wes Nakama
Advertiser Staff Writer
In a first-round game played with championship quality and atmosphere, the Saint Louis School basketball team held off Kaimuki, 47-45, last night in the Hawaiian Airlines State Tournament.
Eugene Tanner • The Honolulu Advertiser
A tense crowd of about 2,200 at Blaisdell Arena watched the teams' main stars — Saint Louis' Jason Rivers and Kai-muki's Daniel Tautofi — hold each other to a combined eight points and the supporting cast from both sides come up with huge performances. In the end, the Crusaders (12-3) survived and will play No. 3 seed Kea'au (13-0) today in a quarterfinal game at 2:15 p.m.
Saint Louis' Jason Rivers loses the ball after driving past Kaimuki's Daniel Tautofi.
"We all said (Kaimuki-Saint Louis) was going to be a great game, and it was a great battle," Saints coach Delbert Tengan said. "The toughest thing for us now is we gotta turn this thing around in about 14 hours and play another game like this. When you expend as much energy as we did until the final seconds, that's tough to do."
Even fans were exhausted after watching the teams struggle for baskets on nearly every possession against suffocating defense. The Crusaders built a 30-20 lead just after halftime, only to see the Bulldogs (12-2) fight back and take the lead at 39-38 with 4:55 remaining in the game.
Saint Louis immediately took the lead back, however, on B.J. Batts' 3-pointer and held on for the victory. Tautofi scored his only basket of the night on a layup with 30 seconds left to cut the Crusaders' lead to 43-42, but Desmond Hanohano's putback with 17 seconds remaining gave the Saints a 45-42 edge. After a missed shot by Kaimuki, Hanohano sank two free throws to seal it at 47-42 with 3 seconds left. The game's final points came on Jimmy Miyasaka's 27-footer at the buzzer.
"I knew they'd be keying on me, and I'd never really faced anyone like Jason before," Tautofi said. "Jason is a great athlete, and guarding him is a lot of work. It was tiring, and it took a lot out of my offense. Trying to work around him and their whole defense, just touching the ball was a challenge and by the time I got it, I was exhausted."
Rivers said guarding Tautofi was no easy chore, either.
"He was averaging about 25 points a game in his last three games, so I took it as a challenge," Rivers said of the burly 6-foot-1 Tautofi. "I play against tough players every day in practice and in our league, so that helps. Even though I'm big (6 feet 3), I can move laterally and I try to keep a wide base."
Miyasaka picked up much of the Bulldogs' scoring burden with a game-high 21 points, and the Bulldogs also got offensive help from forward Nick Milan (nine points) and point guard Richy Miyasaka (eight). Likewise, Rivers was held to six points by Tautofi, but got scoring support from point guard Jonah Lakatani and forward Desmond Hanohano, who each had 11 points.
"Saint Louis is a tough team, I think they can beat (No. 1 seed) Iolani," Kaimuki coach Stephen Lee said. "Our kids played tough, and it is a shame that we had to play each other so early. But hats off to Saint Louis. I told our team that we probably would have had to go through them anyway if we wanted to win the championship, so we might as well play them now. We're not grumbling; we just have to move on."
