Posted on: Friday, March 19, 2004
RECREATION
Nice teams don't finish last in PAL hoops league
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| The Kailua KYAC Bulls, coached by James Rexroat, left, and Lisa Meyer, break from a huddle during the Police Activities League Goodwill Tournament at the Police Academy Gym. The Bulls, competing in the 13-14 division, were taking on No Limits in the tournament.
Photos by Rebecca Breyer • The Honolulu Advertiser |
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By Brandon Masuoka
Advertiser Staff Writer
Kailua Elementary third-grader Chase Hanawahine learned this month that being a good sport does have its rewards.
The 8-year-old's conduct earned him the opportunity to play in his first tournament in a popular police-organized basketball league that celebrates good sportsmanship and draws thousands of children and teens annually.
For the first time, Police Activities League directors on O'ahu have bucked tradition of rewarding only top teams entry to this month's 48-team Goodwill Basketball Tournament in Waipahu. Instead, teams, such as Hanawahine's 10-under team, that best exemplified the league's values of teamwork, sportsmanship and the conduct of coaches and parents have earned an entry.
"I learned (sportsmanship) from my dad and my coach (Herbert)," said Hanawahine, whose Kailua Basketball Association Hornets team finished the regular season with a 5-5 record. "If you knock someone down, help him back up. Don't cry after you lose a game, and don't talk back to the referee."
This season, directors picked about a dozen honorable teams with average or losing records, and bypassed championship teams, which according to organizers, displayed poor sportsmanship leading up to the tournament that features players ages 14 and under.
The tournament ends tomorrow with the Bronco division (age 11-12) after hosting the Pony (13-14) and Mustang (10-under) divisions the past two weeks.
All of the parents and coaches interviewed at the Goodwill Basketball Tournament supported the new sportsmanship format.
Hanawahine's father said the tournament's format was a good idea.
"That's why, I guess, they call it a goodwill tournament," Herbert Hanawahine said. "My boys just started playing sports in the last few years. We never made it to playoffs or tournaments. So for me, I like this side. I've never been on that other side — the winning side. But I can understand how the other parents or coaches feel, if they had the best team, and they didn't make it."
Chase Hanawahine's coach, Calvin Kaleopa'a, said he was lucky to get a good mix of players and parents on this year's team.
"Sometimes you can't control some of your parents," Kaleopa'a said. "I've had some teams, where you got one parent on the side yelling. One parent even made insidious comments about my own team, too."
Kaleopa'a said most of the parents, coaches and players at the goodwill tournament showed good sportsmanship.
"I haven't seen anybody going outside and getting mad or yelling at anybody," Kaleopa'a said. "It's actually been not bad. I've seen the occasional angry person at the referees, but that's just normal."
Moana Scholtz, of Waimanalo, whose 9-year-old son, Kaipo, played in the tournament, said the format was invaluable for the youngsters. Kapio's father, Geoff Oamilda, also coaches the team.
"It teaches the kids to be well-rounded in every area," Scholtz said. "It teaches the kids how to win as a team, and how to lose as a team."
Justin Wills, of Kane'ohe, who coached his 8-year-old son, Joshua, said he hoped the tournament could continue its format.
"It's very good," Wills said of the format. "Especially at this age. Sportsmanship and team togetherness needs to be a top priority."
Honolulu police officer Chad Giesseman, who helps organize PAL activities, said PAL directors changed the postseason selection method to celebrate good sportsmanship, and to eliminate the win-at-all-cost attitude that leads to rowdy parents, coaches and players.
"I've been in PAL almost three years," said Giesseman, who is assigned to the Honolulu Police Department's Juvenile Services Division/Police Activities League. "A couple of years, I've seen some of the top teams that come to the tournament and their coaches — I'm not saying they got bad attitudes — but they're real competitive. It got to a point, where it was displayed just not by the coaching, but the kids and the parents would get really (negatively) loud."
"A lot of the teams were asking, 'Hey, how come we didn't get selected? We came in first,' " Giesseman said. "It was because I had to talk to you guys, four or five times this year. We want teams to understand, our league isn't competitive. It's for the kids. We really want to enforce the sportsmanship."
Giesseman said 12 PAL directors selected the teams for the tournament after monitoring the teams' conduct during regular-season games.
Giesseman said directors enforce penalties ranging from written or verbal reprimands, game suspensions, and indefinite suspension from PAL. He said the game-day atmosphere got so bad once, he halted a PAL game played between teens and threatened to cancel it after overzealous parents "barraged" referees with profanities.
Giesseman said PAL directors want to keep the goodwill format and "want to make this an annual thing."
The O'ahu branch of PAL serves more than 10,000 children ranging in age from 5 to 17 in various sports and activities, such as flag football, volleyball, baseball, karate and judo. It is exploring other activities such as chess and cooking, Giesseman said. The PAL does not charge participants for activities, and also supplies equipment and pays for referees. To get more information about PAL, call 847-0177.
Reach Brandon Masuoka at bmasuoka@honoluluadvertiser.com or 535-2458.
Giesseman said PAL directors did get some lukewarm reaction on the new sportsmanship format from bypassed teams.
Bryan Hanawahine, right, looks for an opening against the defense of Raymond Kahao in a 13-14 age-group division.
