Posted on: Sunday, April 3, 2005
AFTER DEADLINE
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By Anne Harpham
Advertiser Senior Editor
Every year, thousands of Hawai'i high school students take part in interscholastic sports.
Most play for the love of the sport and learn life lessons about teamwork and winning and losing.
But some shine in their sports, earning school, league and public recognition.
We like to share in that recognition and each year we also honor players in football, girls and boys volleyball, softball, girls and boys soccer, girls' and boys basketball, and baseball.
There are many criteria that go into these selections and there are, of course, subjective decisions involved. The choices often generate much debate and we do hear from players, parents, coaches and fans when they disagree with our selections.
We take these choices very seriously and invest a lot of time and care in them.
We know how much they mean to the players and that the pages become keepsakes for many.
There are two ways we handle all-star lists.
League recognition is just that; we run the lists as submitted to us by the leagues. We will run the lists for every league that provides the information to us.
Advertiser All-State teams are put together to honor the best from the entire state.
For all sports except football, Advertiser sports writers Wes Nakama and Leila Wai send ballots to between seven and 15 coaches, sportswriters, sports officials and sometimes scouts.
Nakama and Wai try to get statewide representation.
Those who are sent the ballots are asked to list their choices for first team and second team, player of the year and coach of the year.
Nakama and Wai, who also submit their own ballots, then compile the votes.
Sometimes, they make adjustments, such as adding a spot to the first or second team if the voting is extremely close for a particular position.
For The Advertiser All-State football team, Advertiser sportswriter Stacy Kaneshiro calls between 10 and 12 coaches from around the state for their opinions on who should make the all-star team. Nakama also has some input and from all that information, Kaneshiro selects the teams.
As for selecting the player of the year, The Advertiser sports department doesn't suggest criteria to the voters. Nakama says that his own vote always goes to the player who had the most memorable year overall.
"I think back to 1999, when I was working at the Contra Costa Times. The player-of-the-year voting for girls' basketball came down to two candidates: Aisha Hollins of Berkeley and Corrie Mizusawa of Acalanes.
"Hollins was a national-caliber player, named to some All-America teams and highly recruited by major Division I colleges. As far as pure talent, she was the best player.
"Mizusawa also was an outstanding player and was her league's MVP, but her team competed at the Division III level (as opposed to Berkeley's Division I) in the state playoffs. In the Division II state championship game, Mizusawa scored the final nine points after her team was down 42-38 with under two minutes left to play and led Acalanes to an improbable comeback victory.
"Hollins' team did not win the state title, and might have been eliminated in the semifinals.
"Using my criteria, Mizusawa had the more magical season — the season she would someday tell her grandkids about. She was the Player of the Year."
At a recent Kamehameha football reunion, many past Advertiser All-Star and All-State pages were on display. According to an event organizer, they were a big hit and topic of conversation. Nakama said that was no surprise to him "because it was that way with me and my friends when we were kids."
Senior editor Anne Harpham is The Advertiser's reader representative. Reach her at aharpham@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8033.
