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The Honolulu Advertiser

Posted at 11:38 p.m., Saturday, November 11, 2006

'Iolani beats Damien to advance to state D2 football

By Wes Nakama
Advertiser Staff Writer

Given a new life to defend its Interscholastic League of Honolulu Division II football championship, 'Iolani cashed in Saturday night with a 33-19 victory over Damien at Kaiser Stadium for its third straight league crown.

The Raiders (5-5-1 overall, 3-4-1 ILH) will play O'ahu Interscholastic Association White Conference runner-up Kaimuki (6-3-1 overall) at 7:30 p.m. on Friday in the first round of the DII state tournament at Radford's John Velasco Stadium. 'Iolani won last year's Division II state title and finished second to Campbell in 2004.

"We got lucky and had a second opportunity, so we had to take advantage of it," said Raiders senior quarterback Ryan Dung, who rushed for 122 yards and three touchdowns on 11 carries and also completed seven passes for 131 yards last night. "We're a young team, but we knew we're still the ILH and state DII champs until someone takes it away from us."

'Iolani got its second opportunity when Damien was upset by Pac-Five last week, which led to a tie for first place in the regular-season standings and forced last night's winner-take-all playoff.

The Raiders started strong, taking a 16-0 lead and answering every Monarchs challenge the rest of the way.