Warriors chasing history

Kamehameha’s golfing standard is Nainoa Calip, who won three straight Big Island Interscholastic Federation titles from 2008 to ‘10, setting a high bar for everyone else to shoot for the sky.

The Warriors have never won a boys or girls team championship. There hasn’t been a BIIF girls individual medalist either. There have been challengers, but no champions — other than Calip, who earned a scholarship to the University of Hawaii.

Chasing history is never easy, especially when mighty tradition lives a couple of miles away.

Waiakea has had long periods of dominance. The girls have an unprecedented 10-10 feat, consecutive individual and team championships over the last decade. The boys have had two nine-year runs interrupted in 2003 and last season, both by Hilo.

The blueprint to that string of success is talent and depth. Kamehameha is healthy with the latter, boasting 21 golfers in coach Bob Roman’s program and sprinkled with talent, featuring senior Cody Pereira, sophomore Preston Ching, and senior Healani Kaaihili and junior Shantel Antonio.

Last season at the BIIF championships, Pereira was sixth and Ching was 11th as a freshman. For the girls, Antonio was fifth and Kaaihili was seventh. Their scores (at least 19 shots behind third-place bronze) put them out of the running for a medal, but experience is a priceless teacher.

They all went to the Hawaii High School Athletic Association state championships, along with Ahren Ah Chong, last season on Maui. That’s more valuable experience money can’t buy. Although money does buy time with Hilo’s talented cast of golf instructors, another avenue for improvement.

“We teach the game to newcomers and refine the skills of the BIIF team members. Most of the competition team members have their own professional swing coaches so I don’t adjust those swings, just the mental games and rules applications,” Roman said. “Many of the golfers in BIIF know each other quite well from junior golf, so I keep coaching our troops to play against par, that is the golf course, rather than head-to-head against their friends. My primary golf objective is to get as many players as possible to the state tournament.

“That said, I haven’t concerned myself with league titles in the past, preferring to play as many league-qualified people as possible to get in enough rounds (four) to attempt to reach the state tournament. However, if we get down to the last team tournament with the league team championship still undecided, you can bet the KS big guns, our best BIIF averages up to that point, will be there.”

It’s a coin flip as to what is the most interesting team title race. Hilo lost three starters, including BIIF runner-up Davin Yagi. Waiakea graduated two starters, including BIIF champ Ciera Min.

“The BIIF will be very competitive this season, both boys and girls,” Roman said. “Our boys look quite strong on paper, but we’ll need to prove ourselves on the tough courses of West Hawaii before making judgment. Co-captain seniors Cody Pereira and Bram Paikuli are BIIF seasoned and have the long games to contribute immensely. Their short games have come a long way also. Long-hitting junior Ahren Ah Chong has improved, too, as has the precision shot-making of sophomore Preston Ching.

“Freshmen Kala’i Pomroy and John Andrade work really hard at their games and I feel certain that the results will show early on. Behind those six are senior Maverick Mahi, and sophomores James Shaw and Kua Manuia.”

Roman doesn’t have that type of BIIF competitive depth with the girls. Four start and top three scores are taken. For the boys, five start and the top four scores are taken. But he’s hoping hard work can trump his lack of depth for the girls.

“Healani does a great job as team captain and is capable of scoring much better than she did last year. Shantel, knowing that she is relatively new to and still learning the sport, is the hardest working member of our entire program,” Roman said. “She is a fixture at the driving range and putting green, even when we don’t have scheduled practice. Junior Alana Manuia practices with the most focus of any player I worked with in a long time. Any day now, I expect her to break out of her current scoring plateau and improve a minimum of 10 strokes over last season.

“The success of our girls season as a team will depend upon the availability of all three for all six BIIF team events. We could certainly use a fourth BIIF-qualified girl. Then we would be able to confidently compete with Hilo and Waiakea.”

Roman a Vik

Kamehameha’s golf coach is a 1962 Hilo High graduate, who spent 30 years in the Air Force and retired in 1992 as a Colonel. He then went into the travel industry and retired in 2000, when he became a golf and soccer coach, and later the athletic director at a rural California high school near Yosemite National Park.

In 2004, Roman and wife Claudia returned to Hawaii and that year he was a Kamehameha assistant soccer coach, later moving to the junior varsity boys coaching position. The next year, he joined golf and when soccer overlapped in seasons Roman, owner of a dry sense of humor, stuck with golf.

“As a coach over the years, I personally witnessed three tournament holes-in-one, not mine, and a double eagle, mine, but none of those were as thrilling as watching Nainoa Calip fashion a spectacular 65 one day at (par 72) Volcano,” said Roman, whose coaching philosophy of academics first has followed his post-military career arc.

Roman and Claudia met when she was an Air Force nurse in Michigan, and he was flying KC 135 tankers. She’s now employed by Bay Clinic.

In 2008 at the request of state leadership, he created and managed the Keaau-based STARBASE program, which serves fifth-grade students in local schools by providing enhanced STEM education opportunities.

In 2011, he returned to coaching Kamehameha golf at the request of one of the golfers.

“My coaching philosophy is academics come first. It’s OK to miss practice to get school work done,” said Roman, who then recounted his progress as a golfer. “When I returned from Vietnam at the age of 25, I was a beginning golfer with a hockey slap shot for a swing. It took a long while to get better, so I worked on chipping and putting and that’s what I try to stress to the long bombers on this golf team: short game, short game, short game.

“My lowest handicap was four years ago, but since returning home I have learned to really enjoy golf by not keeping score. As I approach the age of 70, the long game, although pretty straight, is basically gone. ‘I can hear my ball land,’ to quote Lee Trevino. So what’s left but chipping and putting – the short game.”