Perfect finish for Dragons

By JOE FERRARO

Stephens Media

Maurice Miranda rattled off the list of goals for this season’s Honokaa’s boys soccer team Saturday at Waipio Peninsula Soccer Complex.

Finish atop the Big Island Interscholastic Federation Division II standings

Clinch a Hawaii High School Athletic Association state tournament berth with a victory in the BIIF semifinals

cWin a BIIF title

Win a state title

Check. Check. Check. Check.

But there was one other team goal, senior Chayce Moniz said, that Miranda didn’t even know about.

“This is the one of the goals we set at the beginning of the season,” Moniz said on Saturday. “I told them, ‘Guys, we’re not going to lose this season.'”

Check.

Junior midfielder Nino Quijano’s goal in the 73rd minute carried Honokaa to a 1-0 win over Kapaa in the Division II state final, giving the Dragons their second straight title and capping a 19-0 regular season.

Honokaa entered the season with most of the key players who experienced the first of the Dragons’ two state crowns: Moniz and fellow seniors Dylan Shiraki, Robert Connors, Alden Aguirre and Maikai Coelho. On top of that, senior defender Josh Tobias, who missed most of last season with a leg injury, returned to make an already formidable defense close to impenetrable.

With this in mind, Moniz said, a state title was “expected.” So after the Dragons defeated the Warriors (11-2-2) in a rematch of last year’s state final, Moniz expressed the relief of fulfilling expectations instead of unbridled elation.

“It’s very satisfying,” Moniz said. “We definitely wouldn’t have been satisfied if we didn’t win.”

Going into the season Miranda knew the Dragons returned a host of talented players capable of another state title run. Much to his delight, they wanted to improve.

“They raised their game to another level,” Miranda said. “To go undefeated, it means you took your game somewhere.”

The statistics support Miranda’s assessment of the Dragons.

Defensively, the starting back line of Tobias, Aguirre and sophomore defender Tony Connors gave up just two goals — one to Interscholastic League of Honolulu champion Mid-Pacific on Friday and another to Waiakea on Dec. 28 — while playing in front of goalkeeper Maikai Coelho.

Offensively, Honokaa outscored its opponents 79-4 in the 17 matches the Dragons played since the start of the BIIF regular season — they earned their other two wins by forfeit.

After the last of Honokaa’s three nonconference losses — the Dragons fell 3-2 to Kealakehe in the Ka Makani Soccer Classic last November — Miranda said his team needed a consistent goal-scorer to replace the graduated Josh Robinson, who found the net a team-high 15 times last season.

Honokaa didn’t really add that goal-scorer, but a handful of Dragons more than made up for Robinson’s absence.

Warren led the team with 14 goals after scoring five last year, Moniz and Robert Connors each had 13, and Shiraki added 12. That balanced scoring combined with the Dragons’ machine-like, ball-control game made defending Honokaa awfully difficult for opponents.

“You couldn’t just cover one guy,” said Shiraki, who delivered the throw-in that led to Quijano’s goal. “You had to mark everybody. As coach Maurice said, ‘If you want to beat us, you have to play better than us.'”

Behind that offense, Honokaa regularly put teams away by halftime. That wasn’t the case on Saturday even though the Dragons outshot the Warriors 19-5 and put 19 throw-ins into the 18-yard box. But the team’s belief in its offensive system, which regularly generates between 20 and 30 scoring chances per game, didn’t waver.

“I think we were a little antsy at first, but we knew we needed to calm down and (that) the goal was coming,” Quijano said.

Honokaa’s patience led to a moment Quijano called “the best feeling in the world.”

Shiraki’s throw-in skipped through the 18-yard box and almost behind the goal, but Tobias saved the ball near the right goalpost, kicking it over his head and back onto the field of play to sophomore forward Joel Shoemaker-Hassey, who hit a half-volley into the 18-yard box. There, Quijano unloaded a 10-yard shot that deflected off the upper body of a Kapaa defender and past goalkeeper Shane Nishioka-Healy for the match’s lone goal.

Moniz said the adversity in Friday’s 5-1 state semifinal victory over Interscholastic League of Honolulu champion Mid-Pacific prepared the Dragons for a tense state final. Against the Owls, Honokaa experienced the frustration of having what they believed were two sure goals disallowed and faced a 1-0 halftime deficit.

“I think we needed that,” Moniz said. “It was a wakeup call. It wasn’t going to be given to us. We had to work for it.”

The Dragons put forth that effort, and more importantly, Miranda said, they displayed the composure that normally goes hand-in-hand with championships.

“They stayed focused,” Miranda said. “(It was a) very composed group, a very confident group. They knew what they had to do. … They never lost focus.”

As a result, a group of seniors — Shiraki, Moniz, Robert Connors and Aguirre — that spent years playing club soccer under Miranda well before they entered high school got the result they wanted in their final match together.

“Being seniors, it was the best way you can end the season,” Shiraki said.