There’s something to be said for living in a place that’s not too big, not too small. Too big means congestion, people who don’t relate to each other and, usually, living in a small space in a big building. Too small means a lack of diversity, little to do and too many people nosing into your business as a form of entertainment.
The hunch here is that a lot of us Hilo-side people find our location just about right. From the ocean to the mountain top in less than an hour, if you can’t find something to do, that’s on you, the diversity is ennobling and the stories you hear about people are usually the good ones.
Bad news travels fast, but people here like to tell stories about good people, stories that tend to last over time. This is one of those stories.
Far from a complete look at George “Pee Wee” Kai, who we will no doubt talk about more over time, this is just one person’s reflections on a Hilo institution that likely inspired hundreds, if not more, at St. Joseph, where he coached for 31 years.
Kai volunteered all those years, at all the coaching stops he made in and out of schools. He had more than bundles of cash, George Kai had social wealth, something you can’t buy at any cost.
When Kai wasn’t coaching, he was attending games, looking for talent, watching volleyball, softball, baseball, whatever it might have been. There have always been coaches who were more than coaches, they were actually teachers who happened to be coaches.
Around here, most likely because of the Aloha lifestyle, there have been a lot of those kind of coaches whose real life teachings are still alive, even after their passing.
Kai was one of those individuals. We all would have benefited, we would all have likely been a level up in our humanity if we all had a coach like Pee Wee.
“He was a coach,” said Iris McGuire, today the athletic director at Keaau High School, “but he was more than a coach, he was a mentor to me in how to live, how to be a good person, but, yes, he was quite a coach, too.”
McGuire, the youngest of four children with three older brothers, can trace her growth as a person to a day after her sophomore year at Pahoa High School, in the summer of 1986, when Kai approached her on a softball field and asked if she would like to attend St. Joseph when school opened.
“Looking back,” she said, “things started to change after that. I ran home and told my mom what he said, and everyone got pretty excited about it.”
Kai wasn’t just being nice, he noticed McGuire was a big kid, about 5-foot-10, maybe the biggest one on the field. He saw her athleticism, her potential. She said the school offered a partial scholarship, and her family — and extended family — chipped in to afford the tuition at the private school, then things really started to change.
“My brothers were all working, but they worked it out between them to get me to school each day, and when I first got there, Mr. Kai started talking about how I’d be going to college, and how I’d be playing college athletics,” she said. “Honestly? I had never thought about going to college, I was thinking more about joining the military or something like that. Playing sports in college? It literally never crossed my mind.”
But Pee Wee Kai had a way about himself. He was encouraging, had a convincing manner and a persuasive one, all at the same time.
“In basketball, he had a very simple approach,” Iris McGuire said. “He taught the basics but he really leaned into the basics. It was all about not just learning what the basics are — dribbling, the jump stop, the pick and roll — but it was about perfecting the basics.
“People lose sight of the importance of that sometimes, I think — I’ve seen it — but when you think about it, all teams have to rely on the basics, but if you make your basics as close to perfect as you can be and (the opponents) just sort of go through the motions? You have a huge advantage, just in that, and that’s not even about individual talent.”
St. Joseph was, of course, always the little school taking on the bigger, and often much bigger, school, but McGuire never heard coach Kai mention that.
“It wasn’t important to him,” she said. “None of that mattered, it was ‘We have five on the floor, they have five on the floor,’ it was about using what we learned in practice. We had good teams, competitive teams, we would play with anyone and think we could win the game.”
McGuire was always a good student, so Kai didn’t get on her about that, but he kept inquiring, kept encouraging her to do as much as she could academically, assuring her it would pay off later.
Kai was at all sports, including the ones he didn’t coach. He wasn’t about winning so much as he was about seeing kids get involved and find some success in their lives.
“I rely to this very day on what I learned from him,” Iris McGuire said, “he never allowed us to think of ourselves as victims. Back then (1987-88), Waiakea had tremendous teams, they were a real power in those days and he would say, ‘Sure, they have talent, we know that, but in the end, it’s the effort and leaning hard on the basics that wins.’
“He was patient, he had a big view of things. After playing for him, we would meet sometimes for breakfast or lunch and I remember him saying, about coaching, ‘You got to let them grow, and then comes a time, you got to let them go.’
“It was how he saw life, teach the basics, stress the basics, but let them be themselves, let them grow into it, and I think he meant if you do your job, you’ll know when it’s time to let them go.”
When he let go, McGuire went on to Loyola Marymount University, a campus overlooking the ocean about 5 minutes from the Los Angeles International Airport, but on campus it felt like its own world.
She played softball, did well academically and came back home only to be recruited by her mentor.
Kai wanted her to take over basketball coaching for him at St. Joseph, which she was unwilling to do, until she found out the school had suggested he should find a replacement, as he was getting up in years.
Rodney Cambra, the athletic director, told Iris McGuire, “I love Pee Wee, but it’s time.”
She talked with Kai and they all agreed. Iris McGuire helped, then eventually became the coach, but they always maintained their friendship away from the school, meeting for breakfast or lunch to talk story, right up until 1996.
“We were meeting for breakfast and he called me because I was running late,” she recalled, “and I told him, ‘Hang on, I’m on my way.’”
About five minutes later she got a call from Kai’s son, Keoki. Moments after George hung up the phone, he collapsed right there in the living room. An ambulance rushed him to the hospital.
By the time she got to the hospital, George “Pee Wee” Kai had passed away.
It was 24 years ago, but she still remembers him and what he taught.
“I think about him all the time,” she said. “ When I talk to coaches about building relationships, I’m always thinking about him.
“I hope I’m doing him justice, I hope I’m a good legacy for him.”
Word gets around. Iris McGuire has that that kind of respect and she is one of hundreds, if not more, who saw their path in life more clearly from their association with George Kai.
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