Punahou School baseball coach Eric Kadooka knew he could count on senior ace Jeremy Fujimoto to close out a sixth straight state championship win Saturday night against Kailua.

The only question was who would pitch the first five innings for the Buffanblu at Les Murakami Stadium.

He sent junior Burt Kawamoto and freshman Zachery Muenster to the bullpen for pregame warmups, and penciled in Kawamoto as the starter on the lineup card. But as the two were throwing, pitching coach Kyle Shimabukuro had a good feeling about Muenster, who tossed four innings of relief and was the winning pitcher in Thursday's 3-1 quarterfinal victory over No. 1 seed Pearl City.

"Kyle said, 'The kid is ready,' " Kadooka said. "We made the decision, and I changed the lineup."

Muenster threw 5 1/3 shutout innings, but gave up six hits and several deep fly ball outs along the way. So when Elia Lono's two-out bloop single to right field scored courtesy runner Chason Louis-Soares from second base to help Kailua close its deficit to 3-1, Kadooka brought in sophomore left-hander Marcus Yoshii.

Alan Baldwin, a pinch-hitter, then reached on an infield error to score another run and make it 3-2. That's when Kadooka called on Fujimoto, a 5-foot-9, 145-pound right-hander.

"We were fortunate to get to the sixth inning," Kadooka said. "Then we could go with Jeremy and leave it in his hands."

Fujimoto went right to work, striking out Surfrider leadoff hitter Jared Iha on four pitches to end the rally. He then struck out Kale Sumner — a 2008 Advertiser All-State first-team selection — on a 1-2 count to lead off the seventh. Reyn Matsuki, Kailua's No. 3 batter, then struck out on three pitches.

Finally, Fujimoto got cleanup hitter Ryan McMonigle to hit into a groundout to third, setting off the celebration.

"He was throwing hard, but was also mixing speeds," Surfriders coach Corey Ishigo said of Fujimoto. "He did it for them the whole year."

Kadooka said Fujimoto's fastball still had a lot of life despite pitching seven innings (with 12 strikeouts) in Wednesday's first-round victory over Campbell and two innings (for the win) in Friday's semifinal victory over Kamehameha. He compared Fujimoto's clutch performances to similar ones in recent Punahou state tournament runs.

"He was humming it," Kadooka said. "He's another (Jared) Pate, another (Jeeter) Ishida, another (Paul) Snieder, another (Reece) Kiriu. He was big; he definitely stepped up."

Kadooka said the same could be said for the rest of the Buffanblu.

"They believed in themselves, they got it together and worked hard," he said. "All the credit goes to them."