By Wes Nakama
Their campuses lie barely a mile apart, but the Kamehameha football team showed Friday night that it is right now far ahead of Kalihi neighbor Farrington as the visiting Warriors picked apart the Governors, 41-21, in nonleague season opener action at Skippa Diaz Stadium.
Kamehameha used a surprisingly crisp offense and took advantage of multiple Farrington mistakes to jump out to a 21-0 lead midway through the second quarter and held strong even after the Governors settled down to close it to 21-7 four minutes before halftime. Tyler Fujimoto converted a 36-yard field goal and running back Nainoa Melchor added his second short touchdown run of the night to help put the Warriors up, 31-7, at the break.
“I thought the offense executed well, for the most part we were pretty disciplined as far as taking what was there,” Kamehameha coach Kaeo Drummondo said. “We try to see if we can dictate the terms of it, and distribute the football where the defense allows us to. They were disciplined about that tonight, and it showed. That’s the more veteran side of the ball for us this year, and I think that contributes to it, too.
“The offseason (work) always pays off, and the practice during the week. The scout team gives the look we feel we’re going to get, and we make it hard for ourselves Monday through Thursday, so on Friday it will come just a little easier.”
Senior quarterback Mana Forges completed 10 of 16 passes for 191 yards and three TDs with no interceptions, and the Warriors added 84 yards on the ground to complement a balanced attack. Defensively, Kamehameha applied steady pressure on Govs quarterback AJ Stowers and came up with four sacks for minus-49 yards.
Farrington also hurt itself with 14 penalties for 146 yards, which dragged down the Governors despite them possessing the ball for 31 minutes and 29 seconds.
Two early crucial mistakes — fielding a punt and getting tackled at the 1-yard line, and then losing a fumble two plays later — led to Melchor’s two-yard plunge and Fujimoto’s extra point for a quick 7-0 lead just over two minutes into the game. After going three-and-out on the next series, a shanked punt gave the Warriors the ball on the Farrington 20-yard line. One play later, Forges completed a swing pass to Noah Aki, who juked a couple defenders and dashed into the end zone with 7:48 remaining in the first quarter.
“Our special teams … we gave them an easy 14 points,” Governors coach Mike Lafaele said. “Those things, you can’t get ’em back once they happen. And after that, we’re a young team, it’s hard to play when you’re down (14-0 early). It’s a good learning experience for us.”
Kamehameha went up, 21-0, after Forges’ 11-yard touchdown throw to Hazyn Botelho five minutes into the second quarter, but Farrington responded with a seven-play, 73-yard scoring drive capped by running back Amar Pierce’s 3-yard TD run off a direct snap four minutes before halftime. But the Warriors quickly pushed it to 31-7 after Fujimoto’s field goal and Melchor’s touchdown run.
“We kind of settled down a little bit, but then (the Warriors) have some explosive players and made some explosive plays … they’re hard to stop, hard to beat,” Lafaele said. “Our defense is pretty young. I think our D-line is solid in the middle, but not being able to put pressure (on Forges) kind of caused some issues. We put some pressure, but not as much as we normally do. It’s stuff we gotta work on.”
Kamehameha also held the Govs to just 47 yards rushing on 26 carries (1.8 ypc).
“From the film, you could tell their running back is the workhorse for them, so that was the game plan — we can’t let him get going early, (otherwise) it’ll be a long night,” Drummondo said. “So we just had to play fundamentally sound football, anticipate what the tendencies showed us, get off blocks, tackle, execute … there’s a lot of stuff we have to clean up, coverage stuff. We had some leaky drives, so we gotta get into the film and see what was happening where we had some miscommunication.”
Stowers, a hard-throwing lefty, finished 27 of 40 for 216 yards and one TD, with no interceptions.
“He’s a very talented quarterback,” Lafaele said. “There were times he was over-thinking, trying to go for the deep ball when some of the intermediate stuff was wide open. But when we can’t run the ball, it’s a lot harder. We become one-dimensional. We just have to get more chemistry work in, against good competition. So this was a good test, good work for us. (Kamehameha) is a great team, they have a lot of talent.
“I know everybody wants to win, but this was a great learning tool, learning experience. For us coaches, too. We gotta iron out a lot of things. Physically, I think we’re there, but it’s just execution. We weren’t executing. That’s stuff we gotta work on.”
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