KALAHEO — Kristian Manuel may not have had the highest scores, but his versatility and court hustle led the Pu‘uloa Bandits to the top of the Kaua‘i Youth Basketball Association tournament, Saturday. The Bandits, under coach Ken Tangjian, finished undefeated
KALAHEO — Kristian Manuel may not have had the highest scores, but his versatility and court hustle led the Pu‘uloa Bandits to the top of the Kaua‘i Youth Basketball Association tournament, Saturday.
The Bandits, under coach Ken Tangjian, finished undefeated in the three-day tournament that started Thursday at the Kalaheo Neighborhood Center.
Manuel marked a game-high 21 points in the Bandits’ 52-31 win over Team Central in that outing, advancing the Ewa Beach team to a 72-23 showing over the Kaua‘i Ballers and a 54-44 edge over Kaua‘i Basketball, Friday night.
The Bandits closed the tournament on a 62-38 note over Ikaika Basketball, coached by Clay Tang, also of O‘ahu.
Christian Storment, low post for the Bandits, topped the scoring with 19 points followed by Clay Darity and Greg Ching adding 11 and 10 points, respectively.
Noa Wellbrook and Ben Gochenhouer, voted to the Ikaika MVP slot, finished with 10 and nine points, respectively.
Kaua‘i Basketball, coached by Tab Matsumoto and Kyle Pigao, finished tied with Team Central with 2-2 records.
Led by Austin Simao, voted MVP for Kaua‘i Basketball, the team that included high school standouts from three of Kaua‘i public high schools went head-to-head with Team Central and took second place on a 43-38 win led by Malcolm Carter, a standout for Waimea High School during the Kaua‘i Interscholastic Federation season, who pocketed a dozen points, Simao adding nine points in the win.
Spam Lindsey, voted to the MVP team for Team Central, topped the effort with 10 points followed by Canaan Higa, a strong player for the Island School team during the KIF season, adding nine points.
Willis Batol, voted to the MVP team for the Kaua‘i Ballers, combined with Kalalia Kauhane, each player marking 13 points in its 44-34 win over Ikaika Basketball for fourth place after head-to-head play, Saturday.
Aaron Dung, Ben Ota and Wellbrook each netted six points to lead the Ikaika effort.
“You’ve got some really good kids on this island,” Tangjian said. “We had a lot of fun coming here and we’ll be looking for our next trip when we come back to defend our title. Karen and Steven Matsumoto from the KYBA did an excellent job accommodating our boys. They even had someone doing laundry for us.”
Karen Matsumoto said Tang will be back on Kaua‘i with the Ikaika Basketball eighth-grade players during the July Fourth weekend for a series of goodwill games against the KYBA 14 and Under boys summer league teams.
Michelle Lemi, keeping time at the Kaua‘i Youth Football bowl game Saturday night, said more off-island teams are scheduled for tournaments on Kaua‘i when the Merv Lopes tournament gets underway at the Kaua‘i High School gym starting June 24 at 6 p.m.
Lemi said she knows Kaua‘i will have three teams and there is at least one team from Maui coming to that tournament.
• Dennis Fujimoto, photographer and staff writer, can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 253) or dfujimoto@kauaipubco.com
