Iolani's Lexie Tilton (4) is greeted at home plate after hitting a grand slam in the top of the fourth inning, helping the Raiders extend their lead 8-1 against Punahou at McKinley's Tiger Softball Stadium. CJ Caraang | SL

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KAKAAKO—After losing a close game to No. 8 Punahou yesterday, No. 1 Iolani rebounded tonight with an emphatic 12-1 win over the Buffanblu in five innings at McKinley's Tiger Softball Stadium Friday.

Punahou won yesterday's matchup, 7-5, and scored five-unanswered runs in the fifth inning to prevail, but this evening, the Raiders stifled the Buffanblu (3-4) and snapped a two-game losing streak to improve to 5-2 in the Interscholastic League of Honolulu Division I standings.

"Every game we flush it and we come back brand new. We had to make adjustments from yesterday," left fielder Lexie Tilton said.

Iolani traveled to Arizona to participate in the Hamilton Softball Invitational during spring break and their league games were shuffled around. Tomorrow will be their third game in a row and finish the regular season against Kamehameha-Kapalama (5-1), who is currently atop the league standings at 10 AM at Ala Wai. 

"The girls go to bed and get up and it's another softball game. It's a great experience for them, because you never really get to play back-to-back games. I tell them they have to enjoy this moment," Iolani coach Benny Agbayani said.

Tilton might be soft-spoken, but she let her bat do the talking in the fourth inning after her first-ever grand slam cleared the back left center fence.

"I always had faith in her. I had her since she was nine years old. That's the Lexie we know," coach Agbayani said.

Tilton led off the first inning after being hit by a pitch and scored the Raiders' first run off Harley Acosta's single to shallow right field.

The Buffanblu tied it up on Asia Lee's solo home run over centerfield, but that would be their only run of the game.

Kiara Baba started in the circle but after walking Megan Yanagi, Iolani made a change and Ailana Agbayani took over the pitching duties. Agbayani pitched four innings, allowing just one hit, and struck out two and walked one in the win.

Milla Fukuda singled to left to start the third inning and moved over to second on Tilton's sacrifice bunt and then to third after Agbayani grounded to short. Faced with two outs and a 3-1 count, Allie Capello's dribbler to center field scored Fukuda and Acosta followed up with a RBI double to right for a 3-1 lead.

The Raiders broke open the flood gates in the fourth inning. Kaylee Matsuda led off with a single and moved to second after the umpire called interference on the catcher that allowed Kennedie Tsue to go to first. Logan Uechi loaded the bases on a fielder's choice and Fukuda added a run to set up Tilton's momentum-changing at bat.

"I just saw the ball and pulled the trigger," Tilton said of the grand slam. "I wanted to help my team and being able to do that was very important."

"It's all about momentum. These girls work their butts off, practicing hard. They work together and that's the One Team philosophy and it worked tonight," coach Abayani said.

Ailana Agbayani added another single before Punahou made a pitching change, lifting Paige Brunn for Justice Tiberi. Brunn scattered 10 hits, of the eight runs, three were earned in the loss.

Tiberi got Capello to ground out in a double play and Acosta grounded to short to end the inning, but Iolani went up big, 8-1.

Iolani made quick work defensively after Agbayani struck out Yanagi and Tilton caught two consecutive fly balls to end the fourth.

"Our pitchers did their job and I got to do my part to help them out," Tilton said.

Matsuda and Tsue each singled and Uechi moved both runners on a sacrifice bunt. Fukuda was beaned to load the bases and Tilton walked to bring in a run. Ailana Agbayani followed up with a bases-clearing triple to make it 12-1.

Punahou's second hit of the night came off of Sydney Capello's double to lead off the fifth inning. However, Ailana Agbayani caught the first out on a pop fly and Taryn Ho flew out to right and Aliya Hashimoto grounded out to short to end the game.

Punahou concludes the regular season with a road game at Mid-Pacific (0-6) on Monday, Apr. 11.