Kaiser running back Fitou Fisiahi lunges forward for a score against Pearl City. Kristen Izumigawa | Special to SL

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Kaiser's Jeshua Bitanga (32) and Fitou Fisiahi celebrate after a touchdown scored against Pearl City. Jim LeBeau | Special to SL

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Kaiser players celebrate after winning the OIA White title game. Evan Asato | SL

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Pearl City's Kierren McGhee elevates to make a reception over a pair of Kaiser defenders. Eugene Tanner | SL

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Kaiser's Thomas Leong rushed for a game-high 157 yards and three touchdowns against Pearl City. Eugene Tanner | SL

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Fri, Nov 1, 2013 @ Aloha Stadium [ 4:30 pm ]

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Pearl City

21

Kaiser

41

Final	1	2	3	4	T
Pearl City (7-5-0)	14	0	7	0	21
Kaiser (13-1-0)	13	8	12	8	41

• Pass
• Rush
• Rec

Kahoalii Karratti 94 yd

Jordan Taamu 215 yd 1 TD

Thomas Buntenbah-Leong 157 yd 3 TD

Dominic Maneafiga 46 yd 1 TD

Thomas Buntenbah-Leong 61 yd

Kierren McGhee 113 yd 1 TD

HALAWA — Rich Miano has brought Kaiser football full-circle.

Thirty-four years after he helped his alma mater to its only league title as a player, Miano's Cougars brought home the Oahu Interscholastic Association White Conference championship Friday night with their 41-21 win over Pearl City.

A crowd of about 4,000 at Hawaiian Airlines Field at Aloha Stadium saw Kaiser rally from an early deficit, then separate in the second half to win their 10th straight game. The Cougars, who are ranked second in the ScoringLive/OC16 Division II Power Rankings, will draw the OIA's top seed in the six-team state tournament, improved to 10-1 on the year. They will host Big Island Interscholastic Federation-champion Konawaena in a 6 p.m. first-round game Saturday.

"It's not about me, it's about the kids, but that's a hell of a long time (between championships) and we're just happy that we can bring some pride back to the East side," said Miano, the second-year coach. "Kalani played well, you know, we're playing well, so East-side football is improving and we want to make sure that we continue that, but we got a long way to go to a state championship, but we're really happy with an OIA championship."

Thomas Leong and Fitou Fisiiahi led a punishing ground attack that averaged 7 yards per carry and amassed 266 yards for the game. Leong, a lightning-quick tailback, ran for a game-high 157 yards and three touchdowns on 14 carries and Fisiiahi, a bruising fullback who has verbally committed to Oregon State, added 81 yards and two touchdowns on 16 rushes.

"It feels good," said Leong, who scored on runs of 24, 19 and 11 yards. "The team worked really hard, we all did our assignments."

Miano said the plan was to put the ball in Leong's hands all along.

"We felt like if we could get him 20 touches, he could get two-hundred, three-hundred yards and he's just fast," said Miano of Leong, who also return kickoffs and punts. "His toughness was really surprising, in terms of he lowered his shoulder a couple times and he just wanted it."

Pearl City, however, had other plans. The Chargers refused to kick deep to Leong, who has five kick returns for touchdowns, including four kickoffs. In fact, they opened the game with an onside kick, which they recovered and eventually led to the game's first score. Leong did not get a chance to return any kicks Friday night.

"It was real frustrating," Leong said. "I thought they would do one onside kick and then maybe kick it deep later, but they kept doing the onside."

Jake Bactista recovered the onside kick at the Kaiser 48-yard line and Pearl City put together a 10-play drive that included three third-down conversions and culminated in Blake Cooper's 2-yard touchdown run on a toss right. The extra point was blocked by the Cougars' Manase Palu and the Chargers held an early 6-0 lead just two minutes and 28 seconds into the game.

Pearl City tried another onside kick on the ensuing play, but Nic Tom picked the ball out of the air at midfield and went untouched the other way for a Kaiser touchdown. Matt Sai kicked the PAT to give his team a 7-6 lead.

One play later, Jordan Taamu hit Kierren McGhee for a 82-yard touchdown pass on a wheel route down the left sideline. Taamu connected with Dominic Maneafaiga on the 2-point conversion pass to make it 21 points in 31 seconds.

The Cougars scored on their ensuing possession, which covered 54 yards in seven plays, capped by a 24-yard touchdown run by  Leong. Sai's extra-point attempt was blocked by Cooper and Kaiser held a 14-13 lead with 5:55 left in the first quarter.

"We felt like after their trick stuff settled down a little bit and we settled down, we had a good opportunity, but I like what they did," Miano said of Pearl City's strategy on special teams. "They didn't want to kick to (Leong) so they onside — you've got a 50-50 chance — and they got one. We scored a touchdown on the next one. They didn't want to kick to (Leong), and I don't blame them, but they do a lot of good stuff."

Pearl City punted and turned it over on downs on its next two drives before Kaiser took over at its own 37 late in the first quarter.

The Cougars manufactured a 15-play drive that included four third-down conversions and ended with Fisiiahi's 1-yard plunge into the end zone. Fisiiahi carried eight times for 30 yards on the drive, which took five minutes and 46 seconds off the clock.

Kaiser held a 21-14 lead at halftime.

Pearl City tied it at 21-all midway through the third quarter on a 27-yard run by Maneafaiga, who busted through the line of scrimmage and scampered down the left sideline on the play. Maneafaiga also kicked the ensuing extra point.

"I actually was kind of scared at first because we never had been down before so I wasn't sure how we were going to respond to it and we did good," said Leong, who also had team-highs of five receptions for 61 yards. "We didn't let it hold us back, we played even harder."

Leong had a quick answer just minutes later as he turned the right corner on a 19-yard run for his second touchdown of the game. Cooper blocked the PAT again and the Cougars led 27-21 with 3:15 left in the third.

Three plays later, Kaiser's Canaan Saole forced and recovered by fumble by Taamu to give his team possession at the Pearl City 11-yard line. Saole tied for a team-high seven tackles with Parker Higgins, including recorded two sacks.

On the very next play, Leong took the toss from quarterback Lii Karratti and started to the right of the formation before cutting back to the left side and finding the end zone. The two-point run was no good to make the score 33-21 after three quarters.

Fisiiahi closed out the scoring with a 23-yard touchdown run with 5:20 left in the game. Jeshua Bitanga ran in the two-point conversion to give the Cougars a 20-point lead it would not relinquish.

"We came out kind of rocky, they got the onside kick and we thought we were gonna be behind," Leong said. "We never dwelled upon it, we came out strong in the second half and we just pulled it off. It feels really good, we trained hard for this."

Karratti finished 11-of-16 passing for 94 yards with an interception.

Pearl City, the No. 6 team in the SL/OC16 D2 Power Rankings, was trying for its first OIA football championship in school history. It was the first title-game appearance since 2011, when it lost to Waipahu. The Chargers, who has won seven of their last eight games before Friday, fell to 7-4 and will be the OIA's No. 2 team in the state tournament, which gets underway next week.

"We tried to stay in the game on both offense and defense, but they're real good — Kaiser is real good," Pearl City coach Robin Kami said.

Taamu completed 11 of 30 pass attempts for 215 yards with an interception and Maneafaiga rushed for 46 yards on nine carries. Zebadiah Selu had a game-high nine tackles and Cooper added eight stops and an interception.

"They really do a good job of studying your tendencies, stopping the run, stopping the pass and they made some plays — I mean, I appreciate those guys tremendously," Miano said of the Chargers. "I'm not trying to be humble, I'm being honest."

It was the second meeting between the teams this season. Kaiser won a regular-season contest at Pearl City on Oct. 4, by a score of 31-6.