Moanalua rolls McKinley, 42-13


Moanalua kept pace with its perennial division contenders with a 42-13 win against McKinley Saturday night.

Micah Kaneshiro passed for for 255 yards and five touchdowns to lead Na Menehune in the O'ahu Interscholastic Association Red East game at Moanalua stadium.

Na Menehune (4-3 overall, 4-1 Red East) are still in contention for one of the top two seeds for the OIA Red tournament as they enter a bye week before their showdown with Kahuku, ranked first in the ScoringLive/OC 16 Power Rankings, Oct. 6 at Moanalua. Kahuku (4-0) and Farrington (4-0) play next Saturday at Aloha Stadium. Moanalua has clinched at least third, but could be among the top two pending the outcome of the Kahuku-Farrington game and its result of the Kahuku game. Moanalua's only division loss is to Farrington.

"We're ready," said Moanalua defensive lineman Scott Pagano, the state's most sought-after recruit who has verbally committed to Clemson. "We just can't wait. If we beat them, there's a possibility of a three-way tie. We're ready for it. We're good."

The Tigers (2-4, 1-3) have dropped their last three to the top three teams in their division after their non-league win against Crescent Valley in Corvallis, Ore.

The game got off to strange start. For whatever reason, McKinley let the opening kickoff they were receiving go untouched and Moanalua took possession at the Tigers' 10. Three plays later, Kaneshiro hit Jon-Michael Sharsh on an eight-yard TD pass. Landon Ogawa's PAT made it 7-0 just 45 seconds into the game.

But 13 seconds later, the game was tied after Gerime Bradley returned the ensuing kickoff 85 yards for a touchdown and Liva Logoi booted the PAT.

That was a close as it got for the Tigers.

Running back Kaleo Yanai scored on a 48-yard run with 1:44 left in the first quarter to give Moanalua a 14-7 lead.

Kaneshiro would then throw TD passes of 11 yards to Donald Lambert and 32-yards to Sheldon Pagba in the second quarter to give Moanalua a commanding 28-7 lead at the half.

Kaneshiro sandwiched two more TD passes to Lambert - the first for 73 yards and the second for 27 - between a Mathias Tuitele-Iafeta one-yard TD run in the third quarter.

Kaneshiro finished 13 of 26, but was intercepted four times. Lambert had seven receptions for 144 yards.

Pagano, a 6-foot-4, 275-pound senior, led the defense with three tackles for negative yardage, including two sacks. Pagano, who also punts, had a six-yard run off a fake punt that ended with a nifty slide that NFL quarterbacks do to indicate they're downing the ball.

"I played a lot of baseball when I was younger, so the slide came in handy," said a smiling Pagano.

The Tigers. whose issue is depth, struggled to keep up with Na Menehune's scoring despite getting four interceptions off Kaneshiro.



Reach Stacy Kaneshiro at [email protected].