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Former Kamehameha coach Darold Imanaka does not mince his words in regards to the 2013 Division I girls basketball state championship game.

"That is the greatest comeback in the history of basketball," proclaimed Imanaka, who coached the Warriors for three seasons from 2012 to 2014.

His second year at the helm culminated with a 45-39 overtime win over Konawaena on Feb. 8, 2013 to capture Kamehameha's first state crown in 11 seasons. It was the ninth state title in program history — but frankly, it didn't seem all that likely after three quarters.

"We were down 19 (points) at the start of the fourth quarter and we came back and won," Imanaka said. "That was amazing."

In fact, the second-seeded Warriors trailed the top-seeded Wildcats by as many 20 late in the third quarter and found themselves behind by 17 entering the fourth. A layup by Konawaena's Courtney Kaupu on her team's first possession of the stanza made it a 37-18 lead with 7:39 left to play.

Cue the comeback.

A bucket by Alohi Robins-Hardy was followed by a three-point play by Lilia Maio on consecutive possessions to cut it to 37-23 with 6:43 remaining. Maio's offensive rebound led to a Kealani Ryder jumper and Ryder converted a layup in transition to make it a 10-point ball game with 5:26 on the clock.

After Tia Kanoa made the front end of two free throws, Maio rebounded her miss on the second attempt and drew a foul to get to the line herself. Maio made both free throws and Konawaena's lead was down to 37-30 with 4:20 to play.

The Warriors edged even closer after Robins-Hardy sank a pair of free throws with 2:31 remaining to make the score 37-32. Following turnovers on consecutive possessions for the Wildcats, Maio converted another three-point play to make it a one-possession game at 37-35 with 2:07 left.

Konawaena had a chance to pull ahead on its ensuing possession, but Chanelle Molina's shot was blocked by Tori-Jean Cambra and Maio grabbed the defensive board. Cambra missed a 3-pointer on the other end of the floor, but Maio was there to gather the offensive rebound. After a timeout, Maio tied the score at 37-all with a basket inside and 28 seconds left in regulation.

"Lilia Maio, down the stretch of that game was just terrific," noted Kevin Velasco, then an assistant on Imanaka's staff. "She sparked everyone in that fourth quarter."

It was more of the same out of Maio in overtime. After a steal by Kanoa, Maio's jumper put Kamehameha ahead 39-37 with 3:39 left in the extra period. It was her team's first lead since the middle of the first quarter.

Neither team scored for the next three minutes, until Kanoa made both free throws with 36 seconds remaining. She hit two more on the Warriors' next possession to give them a 43-37 advantage.

"Tia for us was kind of like the glue. You know how you always say you need that point guard to be able to keep everybody together? I think what she brought us was that mainland confidence," Velasco said of Kanoa, who had played her first two seasons of high school basketball at La Jolla Country Day in California.

He added, "There's a little confidence there in her play and I think she brought that to the group. Just the way she talked to the girls, distributed the ball and even her scoring, but moreso her leadership as far as being the point guard. Having her to handle the ball I think made everybody feel stronger, feel better about their game."

Konawaena finally ended its scoring drought of more than 11 minutes with an Ihi Victor layup with 27 seconds left in overtime. By then, however, Kamehameha had completed a remarkable 25-0 run and still held a 43-39 lead.

The Wildcats were unable to make it a one-possession game, as the Warriors secured a couple more insurance points from the free-throw line in the closing seconds to hang on by a final score of 45-39.

For Kamehameha it was the first state championship since 2002, when it won the last of three titles in a span of four years. For Imanaka, however, it was his second state championship as a coach — he guided his alma mater, Kalani, to a D2 girls state title in 2006.

"It's not about me. The main thing is the kids," Imanaka affirmed. "We had great parents and great kids, that helped, and I had a great coaching staff, so I was lucky because I just waved the baton. We had good players and you cannot win without good players — and we had a good bench."

A bench that Imanaka utilized to the utmost.

"When I played at Kalani I was fortunate to play every game, (but) one of my friends didn't get to play, so I've always believed that if you come to practice every day and bust your butt, you should play. That's my philosophy, even when I was at Kalani," said Imanaka, a 1971 Kalani graduate.

Imanaka recalled some consternation from a few coaches within the program when he expressed his wishes during an initial meeting with them prior to the 2011-2012 season, just after his hiring.

"My speech to the intermediate and JV coaches was that they need to play everybody. ‘Win, I'm happy. Lose, I'm happy, but play everybody and not this 20-second stuff. Everybody gotta play,' " Imanaka said. "We had to bring up the program and that's the way you're gonna do it. We were gonna take it on the chin, but I don't mind doing that, because it's all about the kids."

There was no pushback from Imanaka's own varsity staff about his stance on playing time, for which he remains ever-grateful to assistants Michael Saito, Dean Sakauae, Edger Palafox and Velasco.

"Those guys backed me up a thousand percent and so we did that, but luckily we won," Imanaka laughed. "If we lost I told parents to blame me and no one else but me."

Velasco noted that the philosophy took some getting used to for the players at first, but they eventually bought in as well.

"Once that happened then it made practices a lot better because the second group or whoever else is pushing the first group and what they kind of figured out is ‘if something happens, I'm ready to go,' versus having not practiced with the first group and so mixing the combinations and having other kids in the game brought a confidence in them and they figured out this is how coach wants it and this is how it's gotta be," Velasco said.

"But as kids would go in and out, it also kept us kind of fresh and that helped us in the state championship game, especially when we got in a little foul trouble and we were able to put other kids in and they produced, but it wasn't easy to get them to buy in to that at first," he explained.

Aside from injured guard Brachelle Nueku, who suffered a season-ending ACL tear before the start of the regular season, Imanaka managed to play every player in every game that year. Well, almost every game.

"Every game except the state final," Imanaka said. "Two didn't get to play. I wish I could have got them in, but the kids that played never gave up and I never gave up on them and they just performed."

Kanoa, the tournament's Most Outstanding Player, scored five of her team-high 16 points in OT and played 33 minutes — both team-high marks. Maio, who was also selected to the All-Tournament Team, recorded a double-double with 14 points and 13 rebounds. She did all of her scoring after halftime and was a perfect 4 for 4 on free throws.

As a team, Kamehameha shot 16 of 22 (72.7 percent) from the line — which was a vast improvement from season one under Imanaka.

"The year before we were a terrible free-throw shooting team. I think we were somewhere in the 40-percent range, so going into the second season one of the those things Darold emphasized is shooting free throws because people will foul us and send us to the line and it'll cost us games, but they worked on it in practice and in that championship game we were surprised ourselves that we were shooting that well," Velasco reminisced. "Lili made four straight down the stretch, which was huge. That kind of changed the game."

After shooting 16.7 percent (3 of 18) from the field in the first half, the Warriors flipped the script and shot 52.6 percent (10 of 19) after the break.

Konawaena led at the half, 22-9.

Velasco recalled the halftime talk in the locker room.

"We just basically told the kids, ‘You either gotta wanna play or we might as well go home. We gotta wanna do it,' like we told them, ‘It's up to you guys what you want to do,' " he said. "Second half we got some early buckets and I think that really got their confidence going. Our bigs started doing a better job inside and we started playing better defense."

Contrary to the Warriors, the Wildcats shot a blistering 55.6 percent (10 of 18) from the field before halftime, but just 33.3 percent (6 of 18) after it.

Freshman Chanelle Molina led Konawaena with 16 points, while Kaupe added 11 in the loss.

It was the first and only time that the Wildcats tasted defeat that season.

Velasco said it was the most memorable comeback that he's ever been a part of it in his coaching career.

"This one was different in the fact that we were down to a team that was perennial champions and a team that doesn't make mistakes," he said of Konawaena. "That's a team that has so much confidence, that I mean, they don't need (coach) Bobbie Awa to tell them what to do. She can look at them and they know what they're supposed to do, that kind of a thing. I don't think I've ever been down that far to come back and pull it out and to do it against any team is one thing, but to pull it out against Konawaena makes it one of the greatest games."

The come-from-behind victory capped off an undefeated 15-0 record that season, including a 12-0 mark in arguably the state's toughest league: the Interscholastic League of Honolulu.

Maio, Kanoa and Robins-Hardy were all selected to the All-ILH First Team, while Ryder was a Second Team pick. Imanaka was tabbed as league Coach of the Year.

During the offseason, Velasco departed the Kapalama campus to take over the girls' team at his alma mater, Punahou. He guided the Buffanblu to both the ILH and state D1 championship in his first season there, which included a couple of hard-fought wins over Imanaka and the Warriors.

"It was tough on my end to see those girls that I coached feeling so down and everything, but I was just grateful that I had the opportunity to coach them the couple years before. Those are great memories for me," Velasco said.

Imanaka stepped down at Kamehameha after the 2014 season. The Warriors compiled an overall record of 42-12 during his three seasons there, including a 28-10 mark against ILH competition.

Kamehameha returned to the D1 state title game in 2019, but lost to Iolani by a score of 52-49.