Kahuku’s Water Polo Team Aims High At State Tournament

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Kahuku’s water polo team (front, from left) Jackie Demoss,
Sarah Bunmee, Noe Wicker, Meme Moody, Taniya Sifton,
Rosie Jaffurs, Mika Bailey, (middle) Coach Keala Whitford,
Ella Aiwohi, Minnie Whitford, Taylor Bushman, Gina Ahue,
Shannon Ching, Morgan Wright, Amy Peterson, (back)
Rachel Kunz, Kalei Ho, Janessa Orme, Kelsey Wardle, Kiara
Daly, Rebecca Fonoimoana, Sarah Lowe, Kailenui Dickson
and Coach Aukai Ferguson. Photo from Aukai Ferguson.

While his team had already qualified for this week’s Local Motion state water polo championships late last week, Kahuku High coach Aukai Ferguson and the Red Raiders still harbored a sense of urgency heading into the weekend. His team was looking to win its fourth straight Oahu Interscholastic Association title. Of equal importance to Kahuku, however, was the prospect of earning the OIA’s top seed and the state tournament’s second seed.

“We’ve a lot of incentive - there’s still a lot left to play for,” Ferguson laughed, noting that projected top-seed Kamehameha would then be in a separate bracket from the Red Raiders,meaning a meeting between the two would likely have to be in the state title game.

Indeed, for all the Red Raiders’ dominance within their OIA format, they hope to be the first team from their league to win the state championship. Last season, Kahuku made it to the title game before losing to Punahou 13-1.

The Red Raiders took an undefeated 11-0 mark into their OIA semifinal with Kalani last Friday (the championship game was to be played on Saturday) and figure to be among the favorites this weekend. Pairings for the state tournament, which will be held Thursday, Friday and Saturday at the Duke Kahanamoku Aquatic Center on the University of Hawaii campus, were to be announced early this week.

“The last two weeks of practice have been our best all season, so we’re peaking at the right time,” Ferguson said.

“The kids have shown tremendous focus.Everyone has been showing up and giving 100 percent, so we have to be happy about that. Because of the rain -we had five practices canceled - we haven’t had that much consistency in practice, but we’ve been seeing improvement in a lot of areas.”

Offensively, the Red Raiders have had no trouble finding scoring. Sophomores Taniya Sifton and Gina Ahue tallied 33 and 30 goals, respectively, for the team during the regular season. In all, Kahuku outscored its 11 opponents by an average of 17-2. Like Ahue, Sifton is a forward-center.

“Of all the girls, she does the best job of creating opportunities to score under pressure,” Ferguson said of Sifton.“She’s capable of scoring off of some really good defenders.”

Other impact players for the Red Raiders this season have included senior co-captains Meme Moody (driver) and Mika Bailey (defender), sophomore Rosie Jaffurs, senior Shannon Ching and freshman Minnie Whitford (18 goals).

In net, senior goalkeeper Morgan Wright will get the call this week. She was a reserve last season behind Sarah Mirels, whose talents now belong to Division I Pacific and earned the starting job in the pre-season.

But for all the talk of offense and defense within the Kahuku program, the area of play in between - transition - remains a big point of emphasis, according to Ferguson.

“The key to playing against the tougher teams will be transition defense,” he said. “Those first four strokes (as the Red Raiders convert from offense to defense) are very important.

“As in hockey, when you get stuck out of position, you sometimes end up having to take a penalty. Our transition will be critical.

“We’ll have to step it up swimming-wise because we’ll be going against some of the top swimmers in the ILH (teams),” Ferguson added. “Offensively, we’ll have to work hard individually to create opportunities.”