KALAHEO — Donovan Harrison launched a trey with just four ticks remaining on the clock to pull the G Unit A to a 26-25 win over Island School as the county’s 12 & Under boys basketball program kicked off Monday
KALAHEO — Donovan Harrison launched a trey with just four ticks remaining on the clock to pull the G Unit A to a 26-25 win over Island School as the county’s 12 & Under boys basketball program kicked off Monday night at the Kalaheo Neighborhood Center.
Trailing 15-9 at the half, Island School exploded for a 16-11 second half run behind the torrid shooting of Canaan Higa, but couldn’t counter Harrison’s buzzer-beating bomb from three-point-land that extracted cheer and applause from the standing-room only crowd at the gym.
Late in the fifth frame, a soft touch from Island School’s Brandon Taylor knotted the contest, 15-15.
A flurry of scoring exchanges between the Unit A red shirts and the Island School blue shirts ensued with Unit A finishing on a deuce advantage, 19-17 at the fifth frame buzzer.
The scoring exchange continued into the final frame before Harrison decided the contest with the sole trey of the contest, the shot arc-ing from the 4 o’ clock mark and extracting comments from the Hanamaulu team that was awaiting their turn on the court.
But, to the credit of Island School coach Greg Myers who had the advantage of parent Guy Higa sitting on his bench, the blue shirts lined up for one final play.
Alex Palacio controlled the ball, Higa set up at halfcourt, and the remainder of the blue shirts peppered the downfield.
Palacio passed. The clock ticked. Higa snagged the inbound, but before he could release, the buzzer sounded as his shot bounced off the backboard, empty.
Higa finished with a game-high 15 points in the loss with Jesse Veerhies and Taylor each contributing four points, and a pair by Palacio rounding out the math, Palacio’s value coming in his height and court sense of grabbing rebounds and opening up the Island School’s inside game.
Manas Kshirsagar topped the Unit A scoring with ten points followed by Harrison’s eight points. Dane Bautista added four with pairs from Kyle Lee and Joel Duronslet closing the scorebooks.
In the second contest of the night, Paleku Yasay racked up 26 points as Hanamaulu outdistanced Kalaheo, 62-31. Micah Rita led the Kalaheo scoring with 19 points.
Nine teams make up the county’s 12 & Under boys basketball league that will be playing games on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays at the Kalaheo Neighborhood Center.
Normal game format calls for three games on each weekday starting at 6 p.m. and each game consisting of six periods of six-minute running time frames, a format that has already been proven successful for the past several years.
Teams in the league that ends on Monday, Feb. 7 include Kalaheo coached by Sandi Nadatani, Island School, C-Town (Lihu‘e) coached by Daniel Simao, the Lihu’e Maniacs under coach Fred Sasan who was in the audience in anticipation of his team’s first appearance, Wednesday.
Coach Brian Inouye and Craig Koga handle the Kaua‘i Fire Raiders, Cecil Gee coaches both the G Unit A, and G Unit B, Hanamaulu is coached by Edwin Yasay and Neil Fagarang, and Robert LaMadrid coaching the Eastside (Kapa‘a) rounds out the field.
