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The Honolulu Advertiser

Posted on: Wednesday, May 4, 2005

West teams hope to rebound

 •  Girl's Basketball: Buffanblu capture ILH title
 •  Baseball: Iolani holds off Saint Louis in ILH

By Wes Nakama
Advertiser Staff Writer

The O'ahu Interscholastic Association girls basketball tournament has been a rough place recently for the best of the West.

The past three years, 11 of the 12 OIA semifinalists have come from the league's Eastern Division, and the past two years, the West's regular-season champion entered the tournament undefeated only to be quickly sent home.

Whether things change in this year's 12-team Red (Division I) Conference tournament — which begins tomorrow with first-round games at school sites — remains to be seen.

"Last year we were 10-0 and got blindsided (in the first round)," Radford coach David Lane said. "The level that McKinley played at was so much higher than ours. But the girls we have returning from that team learned a lot from that game and they realize now they've gotta step up. They know in this tournament, people come to play."

The Rams (11-1) won the West again this season, although they shared the title with Kapolei. A coin flip on Monday gave Kapolei the No. 1 seed for the tournament, and another coin flip gave Kalaheo (11-1) the East's No. 1 seed after it shared the regular-season championship with Kahuku.

Radford won its first 11 games before falling to Kapolei, 37-33, in its regular-season finale. The coin-flip loss cost the Rams home-court advantage for Friday's quarterfinals (they have a first-round bye) and means they must likely play Kaiser (8-4) instead of Farrington (5-7) or Mililani (4-8).

"We would have loved to have played Kapolei again (to break the tie), instead of flipping a coin," Lane said. "But we were in control of our own destiny going into the last game, and we just didn't hold up our end of the deal."

One consolation for Radford and Kapolei is that this year's West champs won't be facing a one-and-out scenario like the past two seasons. That's because the OIA has five Division I state tournament berths this year, meaning the quarterfinal losers will still have a chance to qualify.

Also, this year's return to a 12-team Red Conference tournament field means four more teams have an opportunity. Last year's tournaments included only eight teams from the Red and four in the White (Division II) Conference.

That meant Farrington was left out of the mix despite a 7-4 record.

"We're excited to be back," said Governors coach Jenic Tumaneng, whose team reached the 2003 state semifinals. "Our returnees feel fortunate to have a chance again, because last year we lost a couple close games that could have gone either way, and that cost us."

The four-team White Conference tournament begins with semifinal action on May 11.

Reach Wes Nakama at wnakama@honoluluadvertiser.com or 535-2456.

• • •

OIA Girls Basketball

Red Conference (Division 1) Tournament

Tomorrow

First round

at Kaiser

5 p.m. — East No. 5 Roosevelt vs. West No. 4 Pearl City

7 p.m. — West No. 6 Nanakuli vs. East No. 3 Kaiser

at Leilehua

5 p.m. — West No. 5 Mililani vs. East No. 4 Farrington

7 p.m. — East No. 6 Moanalua vs. West No. 3 Leilehua

Friday

Quarterfinals

at Kalaheo

5 p.m. — Kaiser/Nanakuli winner vs. West No. 2 Radford

7 p.m. — Pearl City/Roosevelt winner vs. East No. 2 Kalaheo

at Kapolei

5 p.m. — Leilehua/Moanalua winner vs. East No. 1 Kahuku

7 p.m. — Farrington/Mililani winner vs. West No. 1 Kapolei

Tuesday

Semifinals and consolation bracket

site and times TBA

May 12

at McKinley

5 p.m. — Fifth place

May 13

at McKinley

5 p.m. — Third place

7 p.m. — Championship