The Aiea baseball team mobs Kobe Kato at home plate after Kato drilled a walkoff single to help Na Alii beat Mililani in eight innings. Sylvia Lee | SL

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WAIPIO — Kobe Kato's game-winning RBI single to right field helped lift Aiea past Mililani, 5-4, in eight innings at Patsy T. Mink Central Oahu Regional Park on Saturday.

"We always want to fight and that's one thing we talk about is competing and never stopping so it was good to see the team stick together. A win like this is good because it shows the younger ones that we can still fight and come back," said Kobe Kato.

After getting drubbed by Campbell, 10-0 three days ago, the Na Alii (1-1) get their first win in the Oahu Interscholastic Association Division I West standings while the Trojans drop to 1-1.

"We are still young and we're still trying to piece together the right lineups. We are getting better and we are a work in progress," said Aiea coach Ryan Kato.

Mililani coach Mark Hirayama can echo the same sentiments of having a young team.

"We are a young club and we are trying to get acclimated to the speed of this level. All the mistakes compounded themselves in a tight ball game so we have to do a better job throwing strikes and making routine plays and we should be alright," said Hirayama.

"That's a good ball club," said coach Kato, on Mililani. "I told the boys, 'I'm not so concerned about the outcome of the game, rather the progress we make during the game and are we getting better?"

Noa Ohara reached on error to lead off the eighth and Ethan Bautista reached on a fielder's choice. Ty Matsunami singled and Chase Ling walked to load the bases. Ryan Kato (Kobe's father) called a quick timeout and following the timeout, Kobe hit a single to right field to score Bautista from third to win the game.

"That's the matchup we wanted and we were looking for and that's why I called the timeout. We have the situation we're looking for, be safe, Kobe get the ball in the air," said coach Kato.

"I was surprised that everything was going for us. We made some mistakes so I was surprised to see how we had so many mistakes that had a chance," said Kobe.

Kato batted 3-for-5 for the game and came in from shortstop to pitch the remaining four innings to relieve Matsunami and tossed five strikes.

"He plays with a lot of emotion, sometimes that gets the best of him, but that's something he has to work on. I love coaching him, but there are still things we have to work on," said coach Kato, on his son.

Mililani led early on after Austin Dela Cruz led off the third inning with a double and advanced to third on a wild pitch. Zach Lafata's bunt scored Dela Cruz and Lafata scored off of Korrey Siracusa's single to center for a 2-0 lead.

Dela Cruz added another Trojan run in the fifth off of Aiea errors and Lafata posed another scoring threat from third. Aiea made the change from Matsunami to Kato, who caused Domogsac to fly out to left and consecutively struck out Bryson Arakaki and Siracusa to prevent further damage.

"Our pitching bailed us out today. Defensively we had some miscues. I think the defensive blunders were due to the pressure situtations, we don't get to be in those situations too often. The good thing is that they overcame it and righted the ship," said coach Kato.

Ohara's single led off the Na Alii attack and Ling reached on error as Aiea managed to capitalize on Trojan miscues to score two runs.

Mililani started with Ethan Muller who went four innings and went to five other pitchers for the game.

"Ethan kepted them off balance and we changed pitchers and we weren't efficient there. We beaned a couple guys and things fell in after that. We have to be better on the mound when you have the lead," said Hirayama.

Casey Kitashima singled to start the sixth inning and Ohara and Matsunami were beaned to load the bases. Ling hit a two RBI single to left center to give Aiea their first lead of the game, 4-3.

"We made mistakes and let them get in front of us. We didn't throw strikes that inning and that's something we can control and work on to get better at," said Hirayama.

Kato struck out Dela Cruz in the top of the seventh, but Lafata reached on an error and stole second. Noah Domogsac singled and advanced to second and Lafata scored on an error to tie the game at 4. Kato managed to strike out Siracusa and a dropped third-strike ousted Taylor Inouye for the third out.

The Na Alii had an opportunity to put the game away in the bottom of the seventh inning. Jake Nakamoto singled and Chase Mindoro came in as a courtesy runner, but he was caught stealing at second base. Teron Kitashima singled, but Casey Kitashima flew out to left field and Makana Fujiyama-Taula grounded out to short as the game went into extra innings.

"That's the work in progress and we are a young team. We had two sophomores running the base paths and they came up from JV and they are getting used to the speed of the game. We are getting better," said coach Kato.

Mililani hosts Leilehua on Mar. 1, while Aiea plays Kapolei on the same afternoon at Central Oahu Regional Park.