KAPAA — Kauai High School’s varsity baseball team defeated Kapaa in both games of Saturday’s doubleheader at Kapaa High School. With the two wins, Kauai (3-0 KIF) took the lead on the Kauai Interscholastic Federation standings. “It’s always good to
KAPAA — Kauai High School’s varsity baseball team defeated Kapaa in both games of Saturday’s doubleheader at Kapaa High School.
With the two wins, Kauai (3-0 KIF) took the lead on the Kauai Interscholastic Federation standings.
“It’s always good to be ahead early in the season,” said Kauai head coach Hank Ibia. “If you get the first round, you’re pretty much set for a playoff at the end of the season.”
– Kauai won the first game, 5-4. All nine runs were scored in the third inning.
Red Raiders junior second baseman Micah Layosa hit a single to center field for 2 RBIs during Kauai’s 5-run inning in the top of the third.
He also took the mound in the seventh inning and recorded his second save of the season.
Junior Patrick Esteban, sophomore Keanu Camalliri, junior Gunner Vallatini, sophomore Matthew Panit and junior Kobey Diaz each scored Kauai’s runs.
“That was a big inning for us. The bats came around,” Layosa said. “Unfortunately, we couldn’t score the runners in the other innings and give our pitcher some more comfort. But we did well. Our defense pulled it off.”
Warriors senior shortstop Keola Lutz smacked a 2-run double in the home half of the third inning.
Senior Bradley Villanueva, junior Jake Rausch, freshman Kalena Harder and senior Chaz Pacleb scored Kapaa’s four runs.
“I was just trying to see his fastball really good. He gave me one and I just took advantage of it,” Lutz said about his double. “We were just putting the ball in play and making their defense work. Tried to put pressure on them.”
Both teams had several base runners in the innings following the third, but weren’t able to get them to cross home plate.
“Again, we got to hit a little bit better with runners in scoring position. We got to take advantage of that, and we didn’t,” said Warriors head Bryan Aiwohi. “We had one good inning, but we left too many runners on. We should have scored some more. And we were getting bad jumps on the steals.”
– Kauai then won the second game, 7-2.
Red Raiders junior second baseman Doug Miyasato hit two singles, a double, 2 RBIs and scored two runs en route to the team’s third win of the KIF season.
“We hit the ball early in the first inning. Put in some runs then. After that, it snowballed all the way around,” Ibia said. “Also, the pitcher was not throwing strikes. So we capitalized on that.”
Kapaa (2-2 KIF) will host Waimea (0-2 KIF) at 3:30 p.m. Wednesday.
Kauai will play Waimea for two games on Saturday at Hanapepe Stadium. The first game will start 10 a.m.
