Luckily for the local soccer community, Akari Shimizu didn’t start surfing until later in her life. If she had, then she probably wouldn’t have helped lead Makua Lani to back-to-back state soccer berths and she wouldn’t have been a standout on the Kona Crush club team, which earned her a recent tryout for the U18 Women’s National Team later this month.
“I love to surf but I’m not good at it,” Shimizu said with a laugh. “If I was able to start at a younger age then maybe I could have surfed for a career, but soccer is a good second choice.”
The Makua Lani junior will head to Chula Vista, California on April 15 to take part in a one-week training camp at the Elite Athlete Training Center, a 155-acre state-of-the-art facility. It is one of the training centers for the USA Olympic and Paralympic teams and in the last six Olympics over 60 medals have been won by soccer players who have worked out there.
“Akari was invited to try out for the USSF Women’s National Team, at the Under-18 age group,” said her Kona Crush coach Vinny La Porta. “The team is 24 players in size and 18 are selected from the 24 for each international event. The USSF invites roughly 36 girls nationwide to tryout for the final team. The 36 player pool is called in to train many times a year. Once you are in the pool, you stay in the pool for a while and they train you.”
La Porta added that Shimizu is the first Big Islander to get the call to attend the training camp.
“It is cool because it shows that someone from the Big Island can make it too,” Shimizu said. “Players from Maui and Oahu have made it but they have a higher level of soccer than we do here. The Big Island is not known for its soccer, especially girls soccer at my age, but this lets the younger girls know they can do something like this.”
Shimizu found soccer at a very young age and excelled early, usually playing with the boys on the Kona Heat club team.
“I first got into the sport because it doesn’t require a lot of money or equipment to play,” Shimizu said. “All you need is a soccer ball, you don’t even need shoes to practice by yourself.”
When she was around 12 or 13 years old, Shimizu met La Porta, who brought her over to Kona Crush to play with the girls. Shimizu credits the coach with getting her to the next level.
“Akari has been growing up in the Kona Crush environment since she was very young,” La Porta said. “She has played many positions and learned the game completely over many years. Her personality that she brings to the pitch is that of cunning creativity… She is the Steph Curry of Kona soccer.”
Shimizu has also played for Makua Lani where she has helped lead the team to success over the past two seasons, with the Lions earning state berths in her sophomore and junior seasons.
“High school is definitely a different level of play,” Shimizu said. “I really love my team. It has been a fun experience playing with people that believe the same thing you do and encourage each other, and we are really getting better. We came really close to beating Hawaii Preparatory Academy this year.”
Shimizu is also being recruited by several colleges but with one year of high school left to go, she did not want to go into detail about the schools since nothing is finalized. She just said that it is “an exciting time,” and that she “will be happy with any of her choices.”