KUKUI GROVE — There was no time to relish victories or look back on losses Sunday. Members of the Kapa‘a High School varsity boys and girls soccer teams, splitting its matches with Kaua‘i High School Saturday night, instead rolled up
KUKUI GROVE — There was no time to relish victories or look back on losses Sunday.
Members of the Kapa‘a High School varsity boys and girls soccer teams, splitting its matches with Kaua‘i High School Saturday night, instead rolled up sleeves and attacked a line of cars that appeared to be stacking up as fast as the players could wash them.
“We don’t want to be caught last-minute,” said coach Todd Fuertes. “We need to fundraise to supplement the program in place. We still need to catch up from some of our pre-season trips, and if we advance to the next level, we don’t want to have to do last-minute fundraising.”
One of the team mothers monitoring the flow of traffic through the Kukui Grove car wash area, said the players are doing this to help offset expenses during the regular season as well as prepare for the Hawai‘i High School Athletic Association state tournament.
“Everyone has been hit with budget cuts,” Fuertes said. “Budget cuts affect everyone so we just have to do what we can.”
With the end of the first round of Kaua‘i Interscholastic Federation giving the Warrior varsity boys a 3-0-1 record following its 3-1 win over Kaua‘i Saturday, and the varsity girls sporting a 2-2 record heading into Round 2 against Waimea, Wednesday evening, there is an assumption that the KIF will have two spots in the HHSAA state Division II championships similar to last year.
“I think we’re going to have two spots like last year,” said Kaua‘i JV coach Karl Ubongen, also the father of Kaua‘i varsity player Ashlyn Ubongen, who scored a hat trick in Kaua‘i’s 5-4 win over the Kapa‘a girls Saturday night. “But I really don’t know.”
The Kapa‘a players were kept busy through much of the 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. event, cars rolling in steadily as the sun broke through the clouds that covered the island for most of the week.
“We had some pre-sales, but we’re doing really well with drive-ins,” the team mom said. “The players haven’t had too much time to rest. They’ve just been going.”
Cyndi Ayonon, one of the car shuttlers and the mother of Kapa‘a girls coach Colby Ayonon, said washing cars was better than selling candy.
“I would rather have them washing cars,” Ayonon said. “Candy is not healthy.”
