LIHUE The Waimea High School girls basketball team coached by Natalie Mata earned the No. 3 seed entering the Snapple Hawaii High School Athletic Association girls basketball Division 2 state championships that start Wednesday and runs through Saturday at the Afook-Chinen Civic Auditorium in Hilo, on the Big Island.
LIHUE — The Waimea High School girls basketball team coached by Natalie Mata earned the No. 3 seed entering the Snapple Hawaii High School Athletic Association girls basketball Division 2 state championships that start Wednesday and runs through Saturday at the Afook-Chinen Civic Auditorium in Hilo, on the Big Island.
The No. 3 seed earns Waimea a bye on opening night Wednesday in the field that includes top seeded Mid Pacific Institute, second seed Seabury Hall, and Kamehameha-Big Island as the No. 4 seed. Teams participating in opening day competition for Division 2 include McKinley taking on Damien in a 1 p.m. matchup; Farrington tangling with Lanai in a 5 p.m. showdown.
Hawaii Preparatory Academy will tip off against Hawaii Baptist in a 7 p.m. contest, and the winner of the match with Hanalani and Campbell, tipping off at 3 p.m., will advance to face Waimea in a Thursday contest tipping off at 1 p.m.
The state Division 2 championship game tips off, Saturday at 7 p.m. in Hilo.
The Menehune, earning the KIF Championships earlier, return to the state Division 2 tournament after finishing in third place at the 2019 tournament. With no graduating seniors on the Starting Five, Waimea’s young team is a homecoming of sorts because its assistant coach Kamie Imai is a former player for Waiakea High School of the Big Island Interscholastic Federation.
The best showing for the KIF at the Division 2 tournament was in 2012 when the Kauai High School team was edged out of the title by Kamehameha School-Big Island. Kapaa High School also finished in fourth place for three consecutive years in 2009, 2010, and 2011.
Regarding “With no graduating seniors on the Starting Five”, there is one starting senior, Cori Burton.