Moanalua is headed up to the OIA Open Division in football.
“It’s a big-time challenge, no doubt,” Na Menehune coach Vince Nihipali told Bedrock Sports Hawaii on Tuesday.
Under OIA guidelines, the regular-season first-place team in Division I moves up to the Open for the next season and the last-place Open squad moves down to D-I.
Moanalua defeated Aiea in the regular season, but lost in the playoffs to Na Alii in 2021. (Image credit: Moanalua Football Facebook Page).
Na Menehune took the 2021 D-I regular-season title, and their gift for that is the heavy-duty competition in the Open for the first time in school history. It did not matter that Aiea wound up surpassing Moanalua (5-2, 4-1 OIA D-I) with a 17-14 league championship game win to qualify for the state tournament. Na Alii, despite that late-season surge, will be staying put in D-I.
And so the last-place Open team, Farrington (0-5 OIA), is moving down to D-I for 2022.
According to OIA officials, that switch was all predicated on the Governors’ wishes. Had they requested to stay up in the Open, both the Govs and Na Menehune would have stayed put. But Farrington wanted down.
A last-place in D-I/first-place in D-II switcheroo nearly came to pass as well. However, Roosevelt (2-4, 2-3 OIA) opted to remain in D-I, allowing Kaiser (9-1, 8-0 OIA) to stay in D-II to defend its title.
In one more move, Radford is headed up from D-II to D-I. That change was originally scheduled to happen before the 2021 season, but at the time, the Rams asked for and received a one-year waiver due to a lower enrollment of students from the military (Radford is located near Joint Base Pearl Harbor/Hickam).
Nihipali, who is going into his second year as Moanalua’s head man, has plenty of experience coaching in the Open as an assistant under Rod York at Mililani.
“Football is football,” Nihipali said. “At the end of the day, it’s about getting the kids ready and the mind-set right. It’s a matter of getting a buy-in from the players, an early buy-in, and to stay healthy, get stronger, bigger, faster, jell as a team and grow. They might get uncomfortable in certain areas (like going up to the Open), but it’s about getting comfortable with being uncomfortable.”
Nihipali considers his first season at Moanalua a success.
“It was a great first year,” he said. ” We battled back from big deficits twice. We were down 21-0 to Roosevelt at the half and won 27-21. We were down big at the half against Waipahu and it came down to an onside kick (in a 21-14 loss). If we had gotten that, it could have ended differently The two games we did lose, we technically had a chance at the end and that showed the resilience that you want. Not everything is going to be easy. It was a successful year. It sucked to not win the championship game, but losing our quarterback (Taylor Malloe) in the second quarter was a big deal.”
And now on the schedule, the Roosevelts and the Waipahus will be replaced by the Kahukus and Mililanis.
“It’s big-time football, with great coaching,” the coach said. “Rod does a great job and runs a tight ship and I learned a lot from him. Nowadays, everyone wants to be seen and some kids will complain that they’re being slept on and saying ‘Nobody is looking at me.’ OK, now you’re going to be seen. It’s not a knock on anybody else, but Kahuku and Mililani are viewed differently. That’s just the way it is”
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