Sabers Want Action After Layoff
By Jack Danilewicz
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Del.icio.usTo date, only a long layoff between games could halt the Campbell girls basketball team’s dominance on the hardwood this season.
The Sabers, who took an Oahu Interscholastic Association Western Conference-best 9-1 record into the weekend, are hoping they can regain the momentum they generated during their regular season when the OIA’s conference tournament begins May 8.
Exactly 17 days will have elapsed since Campbell’s regular-season finale (with Waianae last Saturday) when the Sabers, the No. 1 seed from the West, play their first-round game against Kaiser, the fourth-seeded team from the East. A pair of games with Thompson Academy was also cancelled when Thompson failed to field a team, leaving Campbell without a game April 25, adding to the length of their period of inactivity.
“We want to stay sharp - we were on kind of a nice roll,” said Campbell coach Nathan Macadangdang, whose team’s only loss came to McKinley (43-25) on March 23.“The coaches and I have been going back and forth on (what to do about) it - whether or not we should give them a couple of days off. . .
“I don’t know how it will affect us,” he added. “We’re almost at a standstill. Hopefully, the league will look at this in the future.”
Should the Sabers maintain their level of play from the regular season, there is every reason to believe they can fulfill their goals of winning the OIA’s Division II championship as well as earning the school’s first state tournament appearance since the early ‘90s. The top three finishers at the OIA Tournament earn the league’s berths in the Hawaiian Airlines DII Girls’ State Basketball Tournament, which will take place May 17-20 at Stan Sheriff Center.
“It is something we’re really trying hard to make happen,” Macadangdang said.“We’ve put it out there, and the girls have been responding well.”
While defense has been the Sabers’ forte this season, their offensive balance has gone a long way towards their success. With three players - Aloha DiasKekahuna (11.4), Cheyna Tagura (10.2) and Jenny Sweeney (10.0) - averaging in double figures, opposing defenses have had to play the Sabers straight up.
“If one struggles, someone else usually steps up,” he said. “Teams haven’t been able to key on one player. Our scoring has been spread out.
“They complement each other,” he added. “We’re not the best shooting team, so we stress getting on our rebounds, and Aloha has been relentless on the offensive boards. Cheyna has become one of our more consistent shooters. She’s found her groove. Jenny has been one of our more steady players. We stress working the ball inside-out, and she’s played a big part in that. She gives us good minutes not only on the offensive side, but on the defensive side as well.”
Campbell beat Kaiser 56-36 in the regular-season meeting between the teams, but Macadangdang expects a much closer encounter with the Cougars this time around.
“It will be a challenge - they’ve been picking up their game lately,” Macadangdang said of Kaiser, which was in Division I a year ago. “It looks like Glen (Higuchi) has them buying in.”
Scouting report aside, the Sabers’ focus late last week was on themselves first and foremost.
“Our biggest thing is turnovers - we can’t give the ball up,” Macadangdang said. “We have to control the ball and control the game, and we need to maintain our defense.
“You can score all the points you want, but if can’t stop anybody, it doesn’t matter. We’ve been stressing our defensive intensity.”
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