There was no mistaking Avery Enriques on the volleyball court, where no one quite matched his consistent explosive production.
In his senior season at Kamehameha, he wore uniform No. 15 and served as the team’s L1 or left-side No. 1 hitter.
For all his life, he’s been compared to his brothers: Evan, Emmett, and especially Addison, his twin and competitive rival as an outside hitter.
But Avery separated himself when he was named the BIIF Division I Player of the Year, as selected by the league’s coaches, Hawaii Tribune-Herald, and West Hawaii Today.
Four teammates join Avery on the first team: Addison, middle blocker Nalu Kahapea, and libero Tristen Cross. Others on the first team are Waiakea hitters Kolby Aiona and Santana Madrid, and Kealakehe’s Abraham Kalavi.
“It’s definitely an honor,” Avery said. “But I couldn’t have done it without the support of my teammates and coaches. It’s awesome.”
The twins also jumped ahead of their older siblings where it counts the most with team championships. They were a part of four BIIF titles. Emmett was in on three and Evan on two.
Like their older brothers, the twins started all four years but were setters for their first two seasons. And like Emmett, Avery had to wait his turn for the L1 promotion.
Evan was a three-time POY. When he graduated in 2014, Emmett got the honor the following year. Last season, Kamehameha’s Isaiah Laeha was the POY, and the twins took turns in the L2 role.
It’s the end of the Enriques era. Guy Enriques and his wife Julie don’t have any more sons, and he stepped down as the Kamehameha coach.
Guy Enriques was named the BIIF Coach of the Year, after guiding the Warriors to their sixth straight league crown and an HHSAA runner-up finish.
He’s not only spent a bulk of his life coaching his sons but also cataloging their dog-eat-dog nature, especially between the twins.
“Those two are very competitive and drove each other,” he said. “The best part of their growth was competing against each other, and it didn’t matter what it was, whether it was basketball, fishing or diving. It was who can get the biggest fish or the most fish.
“Evan didn’t have that competition on the volleyball court because he was older and better. Emmett had to wait his turn and knew his time would come. Those two didn’t get that aggression and competition like the twins had. The older two have a lot of respect for each other. We call them the older twins.”
College tour
It was the best time for Guy Enriques to step down because Evan will enter his senior season at Stanford, where he was an All-American honorable mention; Evan was on the first team last year.
The original plan was for Guy and Julie to take in Mountain Pacific Sports Federation matches when Stanford, Cal Baptist (Emmett), Grand Canyon (Avery), or Concordia (Addison) play each other in 2018.
That sort of blew up when Cal Baptist unexpectedly axed its men’s volleyball program and left for the Western Athletic Conference.
Emmett, who was 37th in the nation with 1.92 digs per set, turned into a coveted free agent. Cal State Northridge, UCLA, and Long Beach State are recruiting him. (Evan was 13th with 2.36 dps.)
CSUN, Long Beach State, and Hawaii will be part of the Big West, which will field men’s volleyball in 2018. Schedules have yet to be released.
“It’s going to be awesome for each of us to go on our own path,” Avery said. “We’ve been together all our lives, so it’s good to get separation and our own identity.”
Twin thing
Avery and Addison look alike, though they have different haircuts. But their games are in stark contrast.
Both have all the off-speed shots (tip and roll) and stand at 5-feet-11, so they’ll be liberos in college like their brothers.
But Avery was a workout warrior in the weight room and relied on his power, jumping and hitting. Addison didn’t always swing for the fences when finding the floor.
“Those two would flip flop. Last summer at the USA Volleyball National Championships, we finished fifth and Addie was on the all-tourney team,” Guy Enriques said. “Avery wasn’t there. Normally, when you finish fifth, you don’t make the all-tourney team.
“Avery was more into the power game. He liked to pull the trigger every time and bring the hammer down. And both are good from the back-row attack.”
The family is currently in the Northwest where the Guy Enriques Team Volleyball Camps, now in its 30th year, are held in Washington and Oregon over the summer.
The brothers serve as assistant coaches and often buy shoes at a Nike store owned by a family friend.
“The twins like the same stuff,” Guy Enriques said. “For two years in a row, they bought the same shoe. They’re very similar in that way.”
What the former Kamehameha coach liked best was how the twins stepped into a leadership role like Evan and Emmett.
“Before, the twins would walk out there and just play and not look at the big picture,” he said. “At the end of the season, they needed to take a little more control of the team, and they pushed their teammates the right way.
“Avery has a little more aggressive personality and stood up in good times. That’s the kind of the change we saw in both. They were open and willing to make adjustments in terms of their thinking, instead of just playing and competing. They were more team-oriented.”
Avery and Addison Enriques always pushed each other and pushed their teammates, too. They worked like a team. In the last year of Enriques era, that was the best part about being a twin.