HILO – Kamehameha sophomore Pono Yanagi powered his way around the Hilo Muni golf course with his driver while Waiakea junior Kaelyn Uchida relied on her mindset more than any club in the bag.
Yanagi fired a 4-under-par 68 while Uchida shot a 79 to take medalist honors at the BIIF season-opening meet on Wednesday during a sun-baked day.
“I got fortunate that my game came together,” Yanagi said. “I had an eagle on 1 (par 5, first hole), birdies on 3 and 5, then parred everything out. Par is always good on any tourney day.
“I’ve been really working on my drives, to pinpoint shots instead of taking a shorter club and swing as hard as I can. I’m trying to learn to take a longer club, flight it and get more accurate. It’s still a work-in-progress, but I’m trying to zero in on those kinds of stuff.”
Last year, the Kamehameha boys won their first BIIF team championship, snapping Waiakea’s two-year reign, but they lost a valuable scoring player in Preston Ching, golfing at UH-Hilo.
There are five golfers but only the top four scores count for team standings. For the girls, it’s four starters and the top three scores that count.
Waiakea bunched its scores better than Kamehameha behind Isaiah Kanno (78), Mark Agpawa (80), Kody Laguire (85), and Aiden Oki (86) to take the first BIIF meet, 329 to 334 strokes.
After Yanagi, the other Warriors were Kala’i Pomroy (78), John Andrade (86), and Colt Coakley (102).
Seniors Pomroy and Andrade are co-captions, and Coakley is just a sophomore. Freshmen Travis Chai-Andrade, Teague Adams or Haydin Pahio are competing for the fifth spot.
“None of the freshmen has played tournament golf previously,” Kamehameha coach Bob Roman said. “Overcoming the inexperience in our fourth and fifth players is a huge challenge. As usual, our focus will be to get as many individual players as possible to the state golf tournament.
“Pono falls in love with his driver, but he did pretty well with his putting. We’re looking for more versatility in his game, but I think maturity will take care of that.”
Yanagi is not only changing his mindset, such as acknowledging par is a good thing, but also bearing down on his short game: chipping and putting.
“Today it was not that bad,” he said. “I was fortunate to make long putts to save par. Overall, everything worked out in my favor, putts and chipping. I felt really fortunate that everything came together.”
Waiakea coach Alika Toledo thought his guys left a few shots on the course.
“We weren’t that good,” he said. “We kind of struggled. We were fortunate to get by.”
The BIIF individual crown will be up for grabs because two-time champion and Waiakea graduate Trevor Hirata is golfing at UH-Manoa.
Waiakea girls coach Sandra Goodale doesn’t have to worry about any depth issues anymore. The last time she didn’t have depth was in 2014 when Hilo took the BIIF team title, stopping Waiakea’s 10-year run of dominance.
Now the program just reloads with more talented youngsters entering the BIIF ranks as promising Warriors, including sophomores Tia Kualii and Jillian Mitsuda. Each shot 86 while junior and two-time BIIF champion Kaley Saludares had an 85.
“We’re deep. We’ve got 10 girls and all are fighting for spots for a qualifying round for the next BIIF match,” Goodale said. “We could put any four in on any given day and they would do well. We’re trying to get them ready for the competition at states. The girls’ individual goal is the BIIF title. The team goal is to focus on states.”
The Warriors outscored Hilo 251 to 313 to take the team title, so they’re heading in the right direction even though it’s early.
There’s still one streak of dominance left for the two-time-defending BIIF champions: a Warrior has seized the last 13 BIIF individual titles.
Last year, Uchida was tied for fifth with Mitsuda in the competitive race for the BIIF title, 16 strokes behind Saludares.
Goodale can already see a difference in Uchida, who shot 41 on the front nine and 39 on the back.
“She’s been consistent, and she’s been that way in practice,” Goodale said. “That’s why she was our No. 1 golfer today. She did what she had to do. Her goal was to shoot 79, but she missed a putt on 18.”
Even Uchida wasn’t satisfied.
“It was all right. I could have done better,” she said. “I had one birdie on the fourth hole. I’m just staying positive and following the process.”
She and her dad Lance Uchida came up with four key words — focus, effort, attitude, and relax — as mindset bulletin points. It’s part of her self-belief asset, which she also credited to her swing coach Troy Tamiya.
“He’s helped me with everything, especially to believe in myself,” said Uchida, who knows her teammates are always on her tail. “I like the competition because it pushes me to get better. My goal is to do well at BIIFs and states and help the team win.”