Monday Morning MIL: Lahainaluna’s season ends with 40-13 loss to Leilehua

Moments before Kahi Magno would perform his last act as a Lahainaluna High School football player — speaking as a senior leader to the underclassmen returning — he took a moment to reflect on his career as a Luna.

The Lunas had just lost in the First Hawaiian Bank/HHSAA Division I state quarterfinals, 40-13 to Leilehua, at Sue Cooley Stadium on Saturday night. Magno did what he always does, a little bit of everything, with his 5-foot-8, 165-pound body.

Lahainaluna’s season is over with a 6-5 record, while Leilehua (10-3) advances to face Konawaena on Hawai’i Island on Friday in the semifinals.

Magno ran three times for 18 yards, caught two passes for 8 yards, had six solo tackles, including a quarterback sack, and blocked the final extra point kick of the night, the sixth kick he has blocked this season.

“We’re very proud that we held the MIL champs (title) and never gave it up this year,” Magno said after the Lunas’ 17th straight trip to a state tournament had ended. “All of that came with teamwork, working together, communication. We all had each other’s backs to become MIL champs.”

Magno plans to play baseball this spring for the Lunas and then attend the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa, something that he said was unlikely until this football season. He is considering walking on to help the UH football team, perhaps with former teammates Kaulana Tihada, T.J. Borges and Kuola Watson, all of whom are currently UH freshmen.

As a bit of a preview of what he was about to say to the returning Lunas — a tradition whenever the football season ends for Lahainaluna — Magno said, “This is a lesson for all the underclassmen, like, the offseason they have got to go put in the work as soon as possible; don’t wait, they’ve got to put in the work now.”

The O’ahu Interscholastic Association-champion Mules were simply too much for the Lunas, the D-I champions of the Maui Interscholastic League. Leilehua outgained Lahainaluna 526 yards to 249. Cameron Keeve ran for 256 yards and four touchdowns on 20 carries and eight different receivers caught passes for the Mules.

The Lunas completed just four passes in the game for 28 yards.

The biggest highlight for Lahainaluna was a lightning-strike 82-yard touchdown run by Jaeden-Ian Pascua with 8:13 left in the first half that tied the score 6-6. Ezekial Opunui’s 15-yard touchdown run in the fourth quarter brought the Lunas within 34-13.

“That’s a great team, that’s the reason why they are the OIA Division I champions,” Lahainaluna coach Dean Rickard said. “We were just outplayed, outmatched, and just physically beaten. The quickness that they have, we don’t see nothing like that here on Maui. It’s pretty hard to duplicate that in practice.

“The thing is, all we ever ask is that the kids play to the very end and they gave it their best effort. But, again, the best team won and they were definitely the best team tonight.”

The Lunas said goodbye to 22 seniors after the game, one season after 29 seniors graduated from the program. This year’s class dealt with shortened seasons in 2021 due to the pandemic and last year due to the Lahaina wildfire.

“We’re just proud of our seniors and what they were able to accomplish in the last four years, considering everything that’s been going on,” Rickard said. “It’s not an excuse. They played through it, they played to the end and we’re very proud. 

“Now, let’s look to our future. This game serves as a good reminder of what it really takes to play at the championship level. That’s the message that we’re going to have our seniors speak to, as is our normal tradition.”

Leilehua coach Mark Kurisu was extremely complimentary of the Lunas program and what it has dealt with in the last couple seasons.

“When we first walked onto this field, we looked over into the horizon and said, ‘this is deeper than football, this is brotherhood, a camaraderie,’ and I said ‘we need to honor this community, honor this team justly’ and that was our goal tonight,” Kurisu said. “Yes, we want to play hard and we want to play tough football, but we want to walk away and I hope we’ve earned their respect.”

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SOCCER: Kamehameha Maui’s Evalani Keawekane signs with Seattle University

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Kamehameha Schools Maui senior Evalani Keawekane signed a national letter of intent to play soccer for Seattle University on Wednesday in the Charles Reed Bishop Learning Center in Pukalani.

Next year, Keawekane will play on scholarship for the Redhawks who finished the 2024 season 10-3-6, falling in the Western Athletic Conference tournament semifinals in a shootout to Grand Canyon University.

Keawekane joins a roster that had two Hawai’i players on it this season, including King Kekaulike graduate U’i Kaaihue, who just finished her junior season.

Her parents are Mitzie Keawekane and Amos Lonokailua-Hewett, the administrator of the Maui Emergency Management Agency.

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SOCCER: King Kekaulike grad Madelyn Dougherty leads Sacramento State to NCAA tournament

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Sacramento State University junior midfielder Madelyn Dougherty, a King Kekaulike graduate, was a team captain for the second season in a row and helped lead the Hornets to the NCAA women’s soccer tournament with two goals and two assists this season.

Sacramento State (5-7-9) became the first team in the history of the Big Sky Conference tournament to advance and win the title on penalty kicks in all three of its matches.

Fifth-seeded Sacramento State advanced 4-3 on penalties against No. 4 Northern Arizona and No. 1 Montana, before clinching the title with a 7-6 victory against No. 2 Idaho in the championship match on Nov. 10.

The Hornets’ first appearance in the NCAA tournament in 15 years ended Sunday with a 5-0 loss to No. 1-seeded USC.

HJI’s “Monday Morning MIL” columns appear weekly on Monday mornings with updates on local sports in the Maui Interscholastic League and elsewhere around Maui County. Please send column ideas — anything having to do with sports in Maui County — as well as results and photos to rob@hjinow.org.