When COVID hit, we all knew people who played a little fast and loose with the novel virus, assuming their immune system could handle it without issue, then later discovered they didn’t know as much as they thought.
Others, like Fred Lau, played it by the book.
“I wasn’t going to mess with it,” said the Honokaa football coach. “That’s how (the school district) did it, and I agreed; knock on wood, we wanted to stay COVID free. We practiced in pods of six, outdoors, with the breeze, we took temperatures every day before practice, and then we took them again.
“Our principal (Rachelle Matsumura) said that if we caught people with it, we’d cancel everything, so we stayed on top of it.”
The system is working.
Honokaa is 2-0 with a Thursday game scheduled at Pahoa at 5 p.m.
He had 40 aspirants try out, not as many as some schools, but there’s the benefit of experience in those numbers.
With nine returning starters on defense and seven on offense, Lau begins a step ahead of some schools, and that forms the basis of optimism for the season.
“I think it will be an excellent season,” he said. “Once we get everyone back on the field and into the team again.”
Lau had several players involved in paddling who had late starts, but the familiarity with his particular variety of the spread option — popularized collegiately by the Georgia Tech approach a few years back — should serve the Dragons well.
They are chewing up the turf with running backs Bruce Reinboldt (sophomore) and Micah Acdal, each of whom have rushed for over 100 yards in the first two outings.
Lau made the late decision to start quarterback Elijah Kaupu-Alip, and it looked like a stroke of genius when the signal caller ran for a 90-yard touchdown last week.
“He’s a good passer,” Lay said, “but we really haven’t needed him to that yet.”
The Dragons are averaging over 300 rushing yards after two games.
Honokaa is smaller than a lot of teams, “but we have some quickness and some speed,” he said. “When you don’t have all those big guys, you need to do things a little differently, it doesn’t make sense to try play power football with a group like ours.
“We aren’t going to play smash mouth, but we expect we can keep some of those bigger teams scrambling after us.”
Offensively and defensively, it should be a relatively simple matter of picking up where they left off with the returning players, including a clutch of captains on both sides of the ball, but practice opened with opportunities on special teams.
“Probably our biggest needs would be in the kicking game,” Lau said. “We really don’t have a kicker or a long snapper at this point. We had some interest there in spring practice, but until we get people back from paddling and get them going, that’s going to remain a need.”
Defensively, Uhane MockChew heads a group of returning linebackers to anchor the defense. Lau has had players go on to play after high school, and his standard advice is to go to a smaller school, even a junior college, to get a chance to play early and then make longer term decisions. MockChew might be a little different in that regard.
“I think he’s headed (to college) somewhere, because he has a lot of experience,” Lau said. “He’s been playing football since he was 8 years old, so he has 10 years of playing time behind him.”
Also returning are senior linebackers Mo Kamai and Talen Cazimero, who returned a fumble for a 90-yard touchdown at Kamehameha in 2021 in an early season 13-8 loss that sent the Dragons back to 0-2 after opening season defeat to Hawaii Prep, 16-6.
From there, Honokaa strung together three consecutive wins over Kohala, Pahoa and Ka‘u by a combined score of 137-20 before the season ended with a 7-6 loss back at Kamehameha.
The offense is well established, returning the whole backfield, which is where experience opens up opportunities.
“I’ve had coaches ask me, ‘Are you gonna run that same old offense?’ and I’m pretty sure they wish we would do something else, but these guys know it inside and out and they know the value of keeping the defense guessing by getting as close to 50/50 run and pass as we can.
“With (two quarterbacks who can run), defenses are going to have to be honest when they line up, because they know he will take advantage of them if they don’t.”