Lanakila Boys Volleyball Talent Is No Longer A Secret
By Jack Danilewicz
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Lanakila Baptist School’s volleyball co-coaches Alisha Antonio and Mel Buted didn’t get into coaching to win championships. The school needed an intermediate coach, and both had sons in the program.
“Our philosophy is to teach the fundamentals, and we always have a one-team concept,” said Buted.
Added Antonio, whose maiden name is Nobriega: “We try to keep in it in perspective for them.”
But as they both know from their own playing days at Hawaii Pacific University and University of Hawaii, respectively, there’s more to learn from winning than from the alternative.
With their boys intermediate team on the verge of an ILH Division II title late last week, it was a time of reflection on what may be the prep volleyball community’s best-kept secrets. The Warriors were 6-0 entering the weekend with games remaining with Maryknoll on Saturday and against University High Tuesday. Lanakila had beaten both schools during the first round and was favored to win both matches.
With less than 200 students from grades 7-12 on the Ewa campus, and just eight players on its Intermediate roster, Lanakila’s success seemed far from assured at the beginning of the season. Moreover, they are hampered by not having a gym of their own. The teams practice daily on an outdoor court on the Renton Road property, weathering the elements on occasion.
Its won-loss record aside, the Warriors would still be a resilient bunch. “When the going gets tough, they come together,” Antonio said.
Among the dilemmas the Warriors face by practicing on concrete is simulating game conditions. Teams can’t be as quick to the floor as when playing on a wooden surface.
“Nobody dives or rolls,” said Buted. “At game time, we haven’t had a chance to teach them, because we can’t do it anywhere.”
Injuries are not an option for a team with only eight members. “If we did, we probably wouldn’t have enough players to field a team,” said Buted, who noted that most of the boys are above-average students in the classroom.
Of the eight-member squad, only Antonio’s son, Chayse Antonio, is in eighth grade, while the others are ninth-graders. Chad Adachi, Joshua Buted, Alec Charlton, Nikko Magtoto, Nickolas Osgood, Richard Pajarillo and James Tessier round out the team.
Next season, the group will all move up along with the coaching staff to the junior varsity level, and if all goes according to plan, it’s hard not to envision great things for the spring of 2012 if the Warriors can keep their team intact to play together at the varsity level.
If Lanakila’s collection of talent is unique for a team small in size, Antonio and Buted’s collaboration as coaches is no less noteworthy.
Both have resumes more akin to the varsity or collegiate level. Before moving on to college, where she was an all-American at HPU, Antonio starred at Pearl City, while Buted was a standout at Iolani under Dennis Berg before playing at UH.
“We both do our part equally,” Antonio said. “He played in high school and college, too, so it’s really nice to be able to coach with a person of that caliber. We coached the girls together, too, and went right into the boys season.”
Both agree that playing in such high-profile programs left a big imprint on both as
they run the intermediate program at Lanakila.
Among Buted’s mentors is the late Iolani school legend Father Kenneth R. Bray, whose code of coaching is ingrained on a plaque on the school’s campus.
“Father Bray used to talk a lot about the difference between confidence and overconfidence. Confidence is earned, he would say. Overconfidence comes a dime-a-dozen. I remind them every year.”
Such has been Lanakila’s collective maturity that the coaches have been able to rotate captains during their games as opposed to having one or two for the entire season.
“They’re very teachable, they work hard, and they earn everything,” Antonio said.
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