Freshman Mikey Hanano belted a first-pitch, walk-off solo home run in the bottom of the seventh inning for the Surfriders' fifth-straight win. Leighland Tagawa | SL

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HAWAII KAI — In a matchup of aces, Mikey Hanano was the trump card.

Hanano, a left-hand hitting freshman, belted a first-pitch, walk-off solo home run with one out in the bottom of the seventh inning and Bryson Ewaliko struck out 13 batters in a complete-game four-hitter on the mound to lead Kailua to a 2-1 win over Kaiser Wednesday afternoon.

The Surfriders (5-1) picked up their fifth consecutive win to take over sole possession of first place in the Oahu Interscholastic Association Division I East standings. The Cougars (4-2), who entered the day tied for first, had a two-game win streak snapped and fell into second place — a game behind Kailua at the midpoint of the 12-game regular season.

Ewaliko, a senior right-handed pitcher, threw 64 of his 94 total pitches for strikes, including first-pitch strikes to 16 of the 27 batters he faced. His 13 strikeouts — six of them looking — were a season-high mark. Ewaliko walked two batters and hit one to pick-up his first win in his third start this year.

"He worked through jams. I thought he did a good job on that part. He didn't find command until late in the game and once he did I felt pretty confident in him," Kailua coach Corey Ishigo said.

Ewaliko got a handful of strikeouts off his slider in the early innings before blowing it by hitters with his fastball in the later innings. He also mixed in a few curveballs in between.

"My slider was good today; it helped me a lot and got batters off-balance," Ewaliko said. "I battled my mechanics sometimes, yeah. It wasn't really location, it was just mechanics that was off and once I fixed that everything fell into place."

Kaiser, which was the designated visiting team after the game was moved due to unplayable field conditions at Kailua, took the lead — albeit a brief one — in the top of the third inning.

Landon Shigeta drew a one-out walk and then scooted all the way to third on a Brock Perreira single to right field. Clean-up batter Christian Reasoner then hit a ground ball to the left side of the infield. Third baseman Jalen Ah Yat threw to second baseman Taylor Takata to get Perreira for the second out, but Reasoner beat out Takata's relay to first to plate Shigeta for the go-ahead run.

However, after the first two Kailua batters in the bottom of the third were retired on ground outs by Kaiser starting pitcher Pono Lyman, Ah Yat cranked the first pitch of his second at-bat to right field. The ball clipped the top of the fence before going over for the game-tying run. It was Ah Yat's first homer and fourth extra-base hit this season.

The score remained deadlocked at 1 until the bottom of the seventh. After Lyman got Blazen Lono-Wong to strike out looking on three pitches, Ishigo called Chavis Conceicao back and instead sent Hanano in to pinch hit, despite having just one prior at-bat this season.

"I just felt him, you know, game on the line, this guy's a gamer and I knew that going in, but he's had very few at-bats, maybe one at-bat on the season," Ishigo said.

Hanano said he prepared himself mentally throughout the game in the event that he would be called upon.

"Coach told me to be ready to hit, so I was ready," Hanano said. "He said look for something you can handle. Fastball, go for it and it was a fastball that I could handle."

Hanano turned on Lyman's first offering to him — a fastball on the inside-half of the plate — and sent it over the fence in right field to end the game in walk-off fashion.

"I looked for just a fastball and then on a curveball, I would take," Hanano said. "I got a fastball inside and I just turned on it. I kind of thought it was going to the gap, but it flew and I saw it go over the fence."

Ishigo couldn't help but get emotional when talking about Hanano's late-game heroics.

"He's been wanting to play for us since he was a kid. He could have gone to any school he wanted to, but chose to come here. He looked up to Joey (Cantillo) his whole life; his brother Matt and Joey are best friends. I'm so happy for him," Ishigo said.

Ewaliko praised Hanano for coming through in the clutch.

"He helped us a lot. He's a freshman, by the way, and that was big for a freshman to do and make that play," said Ewaliko, who retired the final eight batters he faced — the last six on strikeouts. He fanned eight — all but one — of Kaiser's hitters at least once.

Lyman, a senior right-hander, struck out five batters, walked three and scattered four hits in 6 1/3 innings. He threw 93 pitches, 58 of them for strikes, and registered first pitch-strikes to 16 of the 26 batters he faced. Lyman is now 2-1 on the season.

"I thought Pono pitched a great game today, he was un-hittable," Ishigo said.

Both teams next play Saturday at 11 a.m. Kaiser will host Moanalua (3-3), while Kailua will try to avenge its lone loss when it takes on Roosevelt (2-4) at Stevenson Middle School.