Surfriders Cap Colorful History With D2 State Title

Wednesday - March 18, 2009
By Jack Danilewicz
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When a Kailua basketball team coached by Merv Lopes made a riveting run to win the 1972 state title, the team had no bigger supporter than 13-year-old Tim Harrison.

Among the prominent players on that team was a senior forward named Pete Smith, who had coached Harrison’s youth team three years earlier.

“Pete was one of my first coaches,“Harrison recalled recently.“His brother Steve was going to coach us, but he was suddenly drafted for Vietnam. Pete was only 15, but he took us and coached us, and we had a decent team.

Kailua’s basketball history didn’t begin with the ‘72 team, but its accomplishments are among the prouder moments in a proud program.When the gym floor was dismantled in 2003 to make way for a new playing surface, Harrison collected the old floor as a memento.

“I have a picnic table made out of that floor,” he said. “A guy named Bennie built it for me.”


March 7, 2009 is now equally significant for Harrison and the Surfrider Nation. That ‘s the night they beat Castle 53-36 for the Division II state championship, giving Kailua its first state title since 1982 (under coach Mel Imai).

Asked late last week if Kailua’s state title had sunk in yet, Harrison said,“It’s starting to.When I got back to school that Monday,everyone was real excited for us.”

In a sense, this title is a reflection of past Windward teams .Harrison’s mentors,after all,were mainly Lopes and Smith. By 1975, Lopes, who had been let go by Kailua, resurfaced at Kalaheo, where Harrison played his last two years of high school, including on the 1976 team that gave Kalaheo its first OIA title. His first experience under Lopes came at Kailua Intermediate, where he coached briefly.

“I was coach-able, but Merv had his own way of getting his point across,” Harrison laughed. “He’s quite the guy. I talk to him all the time and just saw him recently when he was in town.”

Lopes is as much known in the local basketball community for his system of play as for his animated ways on the sideline.

Like Harrison, Kalaheo coach Chico Furtado’s own roots are tied to Lopes and Smith,whom he assisted at both Chaminade and Kalaheo before he took over the Mustangs’ boys’program earlier in the decade.


Furtado also won five OIA titles as the Mustangs’ girls coach, and he played for Lopes at Chaminade.

“Chico and I run the same stuff,” said Harrison, who also coached Kalaheo JV under Smith at one time.

The 2009 championship team “that believes in what we were doing"includes Calen Friel, Kauila Miller,Dylan Farias,Corey Lau,Ali’i, Chevy Mikaele, Rhys Nakakura, Kenny Ellis, Luis Valenzuela, Tesi Fisilau, Jordan Decorte and Isaiah Vasconcellos.

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