Campbell's Jayce Bantolina attempts to put up a shot as McKinley's AJ Ortaleza defends. Sylvia Lee | SL

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020813_bbkb_sl-8271.jpg - Sylvia Lee | SL

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'EWA BEACH-Solomon Leaeno, a force on the football field at linebacker, showed the same prowess on the hardwood with eight of his 13 rebounds on defense in helping host Campbell's 64-56 win against McKinley in the opening round of the O'ahu Interscholastic Association Red tournament Friday night.

The Sabers will travel to East top seed Kalaheo in a quarterfinal Saturday. Tipoff is 6 p.m. Kalaheo is the most decorated OIA team with 17 leagues titles, including last year's in the White.

"We're going to a hostile environment," Campbell coach Wyatt Tau said. "We just have to play. How we played three weeks ago against Waipahu, that's how we got to play. That's the only game I feel we played complete. The two games after that, we were forcing too many things. We're working on it, but we cannot make mistakes in the playoffs."

Gilbert Dayanan led the Sabers with 15 points, including two of the team's five 3-pointers. Jeff Fronda led the Tigers with 14.

In other Red tournament games, Farrington beat Radford 55-42, Mililani edged Roosevelt 61-59 and Kahuku defeated Leilehua 64-59.

In other quarterfinals Saturday, Farrington will visit Pearl City, Mililani will play at Moanalua and Kahuku will travel to Kapolei. All games are 6 p.m., except for a 6:30 p.m. start at Moanalua.

Friday's losers are eliminated from the tournament. Saturday's winner advance to Wednesday semifinals and secure Division I state tournament berths. Saturday's losers fall to the fifth-place semifinals for the final two state berths.

In the six-team White tournament, the East swept Friday's openers with Kaiser beating 'Aiea 67-57 and Kalani taking down Nanakuli, 40-29. Kaiser will travel to Kailua for one semifinal, while Kalani visits Waianae for another. Both start at 6 p.m.

Leaeno's rebounding helped keep the game close in the first half.

"I just knew I was going to help my team if I got the rebounds and just play the big role and get in position for the offensive side.," Leaeno said.

In the second half, which started tied at 27, Leaeno turned up his offense, scoring eight of his 13 points in the third quarter, six coming within the first four minutes to help the Sabers take a 48-44 lead into the fourth.

"As long as he keeps his composure, we'll be fine," Tau said of Leaeno, who just signed a letter of intent to play football at St. Francis (Pa.).

The Sabers pulled away at the start of the fourth with a 9-0 that was fueled by Jayce Bantolina's five points on a 3-pointer to start the run and a putback to close it that made it 57-49. Bantolina also played good defense with three steals and two blocked shots.

The Tigers managed to pull within four with 3:17 left when AJ Ortaleza scored seven points in a 9-0 run. But that was tempered when the Sabers began spreading the wealth, as Joshua Michael Forte scored successive field goals under the baskets.

"For the most part, Campbell moved the ball good," McKinley coach Duane Omori said. "We tried to change our defense up. We gave'em a little hard time at one point, but they regrouped and moved the ball a little bit better.

"I played my kids a lot. I know they were getting tired. We were short-handed. Some of the kids, we had some discipline problems and we took action with them, but for the most part, Campbell played a very good game."