During Spring Break this past week, a spirited team of Kaua‘i youth in the 12 years and under division traveled to Honolulu to compete in the 24th Annual Ted Kimura Memorial Invitational Goodwill Basketball Tournament. The team, which was coordinated
During Spring Break this past week, a spirited team of Kaua‘i youth in the 12 years and under division traveled to Honolulu to compete in the 24th Annual Ted Kimura Memorial Invitational Goodwill Basketball Tournament.
The team, which was coordinated by Mr. Jeff Venzon, and coached by Mr. Billy Ramos, made a very strong showing and took second place in the tournament.
Besides placing second in the tournament, the team also won individual honors with Justin Ramos taking home the Tournament’s Most Outstanding Player Award, and with Mathew Koyama and Scott Taylor being selected to the All-Tournament Team.
Due to the team’s strong showing, the tournament has already extended an invitation to Kaua‘i to compete in next year’s event.
Meanwhile, back on Kaua‘i, Team Laulima, a 14 Under boys basketball team from O‘ahu came to play against three of their Kaua‘i counterparts with Laulima sweeping all three games.
Scott Sublousky netted 21 points to lead Laulima to a 57-32 showing over Motiv-8 who got 14 points from Chance Bukoski on Friday evening.
Saturday’s games saw Wailua being victimized by Laulima, 52-33 with Sublousky again reaping high point honors with a 25-point showing on the court at Kalaheo Neighborhood Center.
C. Doctolero led Wailua with 11 points.
The finale came with Laulima being held to just 32 points in their 32-28 win over Puhi with Lawrence Garcia netting game-high 13 points for Puhi. Sublousky was held to just eight points in that contest.
The visiting Laulima team is coached by former Kaua‘i resident Gene Saulibio who was happy to be able to bring a team back to his roots.
In addition to playing the goodwill games, Saulibio said the organization appreciated the hospitality and aloha shown by each of their host teams as well as Agency on Recreation’s Clyde Vito and Aaron Uyeda who spearheaded the Kaua‘i coordination efforts.
Leland Tottori contributed to this report.
