KEALAKEKUA — While the current Konawaena football team prepped Friday night for their homecoming game against Waiakea, an older generation of Wildcats watched from the sideline, reminiscing on games past.
“Seeing this field, it’s completely different,” Rodney Estencion said. “But it’s really great for the kids to have a nice stadium. Back then, a lot of the boys didn’t play football. It was their first year. I knew football, but all these other boys had to learn.”
Estencion was a member of the 1968 Wildcat team — the first for Konawaena after the long-instituted coffee schedule was abolished — that was being honored at the school’s pre-game homecoming festivities. Estencion came to Konawaena 50 years ago from Radford High School on Oahu, and the seasoned linebacker joined a football team filled with rookies.
That first football team didn’t find the success that the Wildcats of the future would, ending the season with a record of 2-8, but they paved the way for future generations of football players in Kealakekua.
“We mostly played day games, we didn’t play night games. We had a lot of fun doing it though,” Estencion said. “I can’t believe it’s this big now. The kids are so huge, big players compared to us. We were fast though.”
Estencion’s speed earned him the nickname “Crazy Legs,” and he prides himself on having been one of the hardest hitters on that first team.
Others on the ‘68 team at Friday’s game included Clarence Medeiros and Dennis Balucan, two former players who were able to watch their grandsons help defeat Waiakea 41-7.
“Everything’s changed,” Balucan said. “We never had this track, or this field. There were no bleachers either, it was all a grass bank.”
The lack of high-end facilities didn’t stop the ‘68 team from creating a high-energy atmosphere for the few fans back in the day. Medeiros said the team then was just excited to “get dirty” on the field and to get the opportunity to try a new sport.
“It’s much more alive now,” Medeiros said. “Football is alive here, and it brings a lot of people here.”
Football brought more than just the former Wildcat players together. Medeiros fondly remembers meeting his wife, Nellie, in high school, and said those memories are what’s special to him about those early years.
“My wife was a songleader, and I had my eye on her,” Medeiros said. “I knew she was the one. So as long as I was in the game, she was on the sideline and my eyes were on her. That was my favorite thing, besides the game.”
Earl Crozier, the first head coach of Konawaena, also returned to the sideline Friday to cheer on the current generation of Wildcats. He said being a part of the start of the varsity program is his fondest memory during his time at Konawaena. Crozier said his desire to return for the 50th anniversary was out of curiosity to see what had changed since 1968.
“The facilities, the field, everything back then was kind of rough and tumble when it started,” Crozier said. “But other than that, there’s not much of a difference from tonight.”
The football players weren’t the only ones being honored Friday night. Carolyn Machado, the 1968 homecoming queen, also walked alongside the team around Julian Yates Field to the applause of many fans. Machado had left Hawaii after she graduated from high school to attend Colorado State University before moving to New York for 27 years. She returned to Kona to retire, and said coming back for a Wildcat football game was like coming home.
“My roots are here. I’m a Wildcat at heart,” Machado said. “My beginnings were here, and I took it everywhere I went.”
