Boys Round One Goes To The Raiders, 43-41
by Al Linsky
The night before, at Punahou, the first round went to the Puns in the girls' varsity basketball matchup of number one vs number two.
Moving to the Iolani campus for the boys the next night gave round one to the Raiders in a similar one vs two contest.
Hmmm, maybe there is something to that homecourt advantage?
In the season opener, after a brutal pre-season schedule for both teams, it was an all-out battle for ILH supremacy that had the rafters shaking. Turnovers and spotty foul shooting probably were the biggest reasons that the Puns couldn't pull this one out, but they had their chances.
With five minutes left, it was tied at 35-35.
With 2:35 left it was tied at 39-39.
With 18 seconds left it was tied at 41-41!
After three timeouts to talk about what they would do, the Raiders set up a play that didn't work. But, Taylor Mounts never gave up on it and was able to get the tip in with 1 second left for the 43-41 victory.
For Punahou, Dalton Hilliard had 2 points, Robbie Toma 1, Henry Cassiday 7, Kameron Steinhoff 19 and Trevor Crabb 8.
For the Raiders it was Kela Marciel with 3, Trevyn Tulonghari 14, Lionel Fujioka 4, Pablo Warner 8 and Taylor Mounts 14.
Coming in to this game, the Puns had the number 1 state ranking with the Raiders at number 2. That will probably be reversed when the next poll comes out. The next time these two teams meet will be January 22 at Punahou. In the meantime, each team will play about 5 games with many chances to fall, but the chances are their next meeting will also be 1 versus 2.
For more photos, please see iolani-events.org.
