What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

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@ChadFukuoka:

OK; perhaps a scrawny, non-athletic teen isn't necessarily a nerd. But, whatever you call him, my point is that I don't think he'll necessarily feel any different at St Louis School than he would at any other high school. He'd probably feel like an outcast at any school.

And, I'd agree that not everyone who attends a high school football game is a jock. Going to a high school football game is supposed to be the "in" thing to do; students are encouraged to come to the game and support their team and their school. I mean, a high school football game is kind of fun when you're a student:
1. There's action on the field, if you're paying attention to it.
2. The band is there, and there's a sense of competition with the other school's band.
3. The cheerleaders are there, which the boys often find interesting.
4. You're usually hanging-out with your friends.
5. If you're sitting in the cheering section, it's even more fun. When I was in high school in the mid-'70s, cheering sections were wild. Everyone was usually sitting close together; the cheering section was usually fairly crowded. When the band played and everyone got up to "boogie" (dance), girls from your school that you didn't even know would bump you with their hips as they boogied, if they happened to be sitting next to you. I mean, that's wild! Usually they were the older girls, like juniors and seniors. Things like that really made you feel accepted as another student at the school; it created a sense of school spirit, unity, and belonging. Those were the days, for sure. I don't know if it's that way in high school cheering sections today. Well, we won't know for sure until this darned pandemic lifts; fans aren't even allowed at football games right now. Ain't that the pits.

No, I don't think participation in just any old sport makes you a jock. My impression is that it would have to be football (for sure), basketball, and perhaps wrestling. I mean, I don't see how being on the school's tennis team or bowling team, for example, makes you a "jock".

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

Post by Jacob Makaiwi »

I nerded out and did all the calculations from the actual OIA championship games which started in 1970 until the year 2019. There’s also a 1966 OIA championship game that needed to happen because of a tie between two teams’ records.

Most OIA championship game appearances (in the top tier division of each year) since 1966 & 1970-2019:
- 30: Kahuku
- 24: Waianae
- 9: Mililani
- 8 each: Farrington, & Kailua
- 5 each: Castle & Leilehua
- 3: Kaiser
- 2 each: McKinley, Campbell, & Radford
- 1 each: Kalaheo, Aiea, Waipahu, & Nanakuli

Most OIA Championship Wins (in the top tier Division)
- 20: Kahuku
- 16: Waianae
- 4: Mililani (they were GIVEN one crown because of Kahuku’s ineligible player but I’m 90% sure they would have lost that game 😂)
- 3: Leilehua
- 2: Radford
- 1 each: Farrington, Castle, Waipahu, Nanakuli, & Kaiser

And here are the rest of the OIA that has NEVER made an OIA championship appearance (at the top tier Division)
- Waialua
- Pearl City
- Moanalua
- Roosevelt
- Kaimuki
- Kalani
- Kapolei (but it’s only been a school since the year 2000)

I like this topic! It’s hard to fully figure out the answer. But for the most part Oahu High Schools are in different towns around the island or different sections of Honolulu.

From my calculations it’s easy to see that Kahuku & Waianae are OIA kings.

- Waianae ruled the ‘70s and ‘80’s.
- Waianae and Kahuku shared the ‘90s.
- Kahuku ruled the 00’s
- Kahuku and Mililani shared the ‘10’s.
- And of course some teams made splashes here and there, including my Mules.

From all the teams and sections of Oahu it would show that Waianae and Kahuku side (Laie, Hauula) have the most success by a long shot. It seems like there’s been decent success in Central Oahu with Mililani and Wahiawa towns. Good showing from the east side with Kaneohe and Kailua/Waimanalo. And good showing from Kalihi.

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

Post by Jacob Makaiwi »

The teams with least success would be the “townies” stretching from Pearl City east through Honolulu and ending in Hawaii Kai area. Kalihi would be the only big outlier. But pretty much in overall history if you’re outside of town specifically in Waianae, Laie side, Central Oahu, or East side things have been great or pretty good. Times have changed with different schools being “weaker” but it seems consistently “weak” with the “townie” teams. And there’s been a huge push in central Oahu, specifically Mililani. It’s no secret that they have players living outside of their boundaries, but they have success nonetheless.

So looking at this you just have to see logistics, demographics, patterns. Like someone mentioned here before, if you have bigger, stronger, more athletic guys then your football teams probably better than most. Polynesians (Hawaiian, Samoan, Tongans) seem to fit that category pretty well so it’s no surprise with Laie side, Waianae side doing great and Kalihi having a decent showing.

Then there’s the fact that those outside of town are overall better in football. My personal opinion is that these places outside of town historically have been more rugged places compared to most parts of town, so kids there play outside more often. Many kids outside of townie areas have ancestry that gives them good physicality when it comes to strength and athleticism. It’s stereotyping but “Townies” seem to have ancestry with less physical and athletic genes and also without more social norms of playing outside. There’s always outliers, but for the most part I feel this is true.

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

Post by Jacob Makaiwi »

But other than good genes and culture of playing outside a lot, there’s also coaching and Football culture. Coaching can make a huge difference. At Leilehua for example a coach named Nolan Tokuda was the head coach from 2004-2016.
Leilehua had good runs in the 70s and 80s, but were horrible in the 90s and beginning of the 2000s.
In 2003 the team went 3-5.
When Tokuda took over the very next year in 2004 they went 10-4 and made it all the way to the State championship game. He then brought the Mules to 2 more state championships and won once. The Mules were a great team and a good team after he started coaching them. Side note: (Coach Rod York used to coach at Leilehua under Tokuda).

It was the same town of Wahiawa. This was before OIA “recruiting” became a thing. But Coach Tokuda turned around the program from a losing one to a winning one. But what happens when you start having success? More people want to join in on the fun. More Wahiawa boys started getting excited and wanted to play for Leilehua. As a 11 year old boy playing tackle football in Wahiawa I went to the State Championship game with my family and watched Leilehua play. Of course it made me excited knowing my own town could make it to the big dance. And Going to Leilehua home games, seeing the crowd cheer, especially when your team wins is exhilarating. It makes you want to play for them. I don’t think the success at Leilehua in the 2000’s and early 2010’s was a coincidence. I believe coaching, winning, and success brought excitement and pride for Leilehua. And the Wahiawa boys looked forward to playing for the Mules when they got into high-school. Other than genetics it’s no wonder why Kahuku does so good. Their football has had so much success that the boys at a young age dream of also going to their own championship game one day and train super hard for it. I honestly feel Kahuku and Farrington (at least in the 2000’s and early 2010’s) are of the same physical makeup. But the winning tradition and culture for Kahuku has made them way more successful than Farrington. It’s just the culture. They’re just built different down Laie/Hauula, Kahuku side.

And now we are in the recruiting phase in public schools. As of the 2010s I believe it became a more common thing (kids living outside school boundaries claiming residency in it so they can play for them). Mililani is always an easy target for this example. But to be honest I think Coach York has built that program. And like St.Louis as of late, kids WANT to play for Mililani. So there is recruitment yeah, and he might have done some of that to make their program better at some point, but there’s also that excitement of playing for potentially the best team in the State and having all that success as an athlete. Shoot I’m pretty sure if Kahuku was closer to the other parts of the island plenty of kids wanting to win in football would also go there! A good friend of mine was a starting olineman on Kahuku’s football team even though he lived his whole life in the Castle district. He helped them win a State championship in 2011.

So Coach York built that excitement and that culture at Mililani. And he is a great coach! People may want to take that away from him because of the “recruiting”, but he’s a great coach because he has a great coaching mind and is really really invested in Mililani Football and in the players. I don’t blame kids for wanting to play for him. It’s not a coincidence that they’ve been to the OIA championship 8 times since 2010 (the year he became head coach)! I just wish he didn’t recruit as much to begin with and I just wish he stopped taking Wahiawa players that could play for Leilehua!! but it is what it is I guess.

So my guess is that genetics, the way you grow up (if plenty kids around you played outside), great Coaching, and winning Culture all play a huge part to Football success for each area on the island of Oahu.

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

Post by ChadFukuoka »

Jacob Makaiwi wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 1:19 am But other than good genes and culture of playing outside a lot, there’s also coaching and Football culture. Coaching can make a huge difference. At Leilehua for example a coach named Nolan Tokuda was the head coach from 2004-2016.
Leilehua had good runs in the 70s and 80s, but were horrible in the 90s and beginning of the 2000s.
In 2003 the team went 3-5.
When Tokuda took over the very next year in 2004 they went 10-4 and made it all the way to the State championship game. He then brought the Mules to 2 more state championships and won once. The Mules were a great team and a good team after he started coaching them. Side note: (Coach Rod York used to coach at Leilehua under Tokuda).

It was the same town of Wahiawa. This was before OIA “recruiting” became a thing. But Coach Tokuda turned around the program from a losing one to a winning one. But what happens when you start having success? More people want to join in on the fun. More Wahiawa boys started getting excited and wanted to play for Leilehua. As a 11 year old boy playing tackle football in Wahiawa I went to the State Championship game with my family and watched Leilehua play. Of course it made me excited knowing my own town could make it to the big dance. And Going to Leilehua home games, seeing the crowd cheer, especially when your team wins is exhilarating. It makes you want to play for them. I don’t think the success at Leilehua in the 2000’s and early 2010’s was a coincidence. I believe coaching, winning, and success brought excitement and pride for Leilehua. And the Wahiawa boys looked forward to playing for the Mules when they got into high-school. Other than genetics it’s no wonder why Kahuku does so good. Their football has had so much success that the boys at a young age dream of also going to their own championship game one day and train super hard for it. I honestly feel Kahuku and Farrington (at least in the 2000’s and early 2010’s) are of the same physical makeup. But the winning tradition and culture for Kahuku has made them way more successful than Farrington. It’s just the culture. They’re just built different down Laie/Hauula, Kahuku side.

And now we are in the recruiting phase in public schools. As of the 2010s I believe it became a more common thing (kids living outside school boundaries claiming residency in it so they can play for them). Mililani is always an easy target for this example. But to be honest I think Coach York has built that program. And like St.Louis as of late, kids WANT to play for Mililani. So there is recruitment yeah, and he might have done some of that to make their program better at some point, but there’s also that excitement of playing for potentially the best team in the State and having all that success as an athlete. Shoot I’m pretty sure if Kahuku was closer to the other parts of the island plenty of kids wanting to win in football would also go there! A good friend of mine was a starting olineman on Kahuku’s football team even though he lived his whole life in the Castle district. He helped them win a State championship in 2011.

So Coach York built that excitement and that culture at Mililani. And he is a great coach! People may want to take that away from him because of the “recruiting”, but he’s a great coach because he has a great coaching mind and is really really invested in Mililani Football and in the players. I don’t blame kids for wanting to play for him. It’s not a coincidence that they’ve been to the OIA championship 8 times since 2010 (the year he became head coach)! I just wish he didn’t recruit as much to begin with and I just wish he stopped taking Wahiawa players that could play for Leilehua!! but it is what it is I guess.

So my guess is that genetics, the way you grow up (if plenty kids around you played outside), great Coaching, and winning Culture all play a huge part to Football success for each area on the island of Oahu.
Leilehua has still been successful in recent years. There is still a lot of hometown Wahaiwa pride. They haven’t been truly overshadowed by Mililani.

I’ve always kind of felt teams like Waialua and Nanakuli have been overshadowed by Kahuku and Waianae respectively. It must be nearly impossible to create a strong program at those two schools. Lower enrollment, being the “second” team in your geographical region, playing in Division 2 instead of the Open, less of a winning culture. It’s pretty amazing that Waialua was able to win a Division 2 OIA championship a few years ago.

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

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Jacob Makaiwi wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 1:17 am I nerded out and did all the calculations from the actual OIA championship games which started in 1970 until the year 2019. There’s also a 1966 OIA championship game that needed to happen because of a tie between two teams’ records.

Most OIA championship game appearances (in the top tier division of each year) since 1966 & 1970-2019:
- 30: Kahuku
- 24: Waianae
- 9: Mililani
- 8 each: Farrington, & Kailua
- 5 each: Castle & Leilehua
- 3: Kaiser
- 2 each: McKinley, Campbell, & Radford
- 1 each: Kalaheo, Aiea, Waipahu, & Nanakuli

Most OIA Championship Wins (in the top tier Division)
- 20: Kahuku
- 16: Waianae
- 4: Mililani (they were GIVEN one crown because of Kahuku’s ineligible player but I’m 90% sure they would have lost that game 😂)
- 3: Leilehua
- 2: Radford
- 1 each: Farrington, Castle, Waipahu, Nanakuli, & Kaiser

And here are the rest of the OIA that has NEVER made an OIA championship appearance (at the top tier Division)
- Waialua
- Pearl City
- Moanalua
- Roosevelt
- Kaimuki
- Kalani
- Kapolei (but it’s only been a school since the year 2000)

I like this topic! It’s hard to fully figure out the answer. But for the most part Oahu High Schools are in different towns around the island or different sections of Honolulu.

From my calculations it’s easy to see that Kahuku & Waianae are OIA kings.

- Waianae ruled the ‘70s and ‘80’s.
- Waianae and Kahuku shared the ‘90s.
- Kahuku ruled the 00’s
- Kahuku and Mililani shared the ‘10’s.
- And of course some teams made splashes here and there, including my Mules.

From all the teams and sections of Oahu it would show that Waianae and Kahuku side (Laie, Hauula) have the most success by a long shot. It seems like there’s been decent success in Central Oahu with Mililani and Wahiawa towns. Good showing from the east side with Kaneohe and Kailua/Waimanalo. And good showing from Kalihi.
@Jacob Makaiwi:
I suspect that for kids playing at the schools now, the past is something abstract and simply "out there" somewhere. I thinks kids on football teams today are all about now, and trying to win as many games as possible this season.

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

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Jacob Makaiwi wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 1:18 am The teams with least success would be the “townies” stretching from Pearl City east through Honolulu and ending in Hawaii Kai area. Kalihi would be the only big outlier. But pretty much in overall history if you’re outside of town specifically in Waianae, Laie side, Central Oahu, or East side things have been great or pretty good. Times have changed with different schools being “weaker” but it seems consistently “weak” with the “townie” teams. And there’s been a huge push in central Oahu, specifically Mililani. It’s no secret that they have players living outside of their boundaries, but they have success nonetheless.

So looking at this you just have to see logistics, demographics, patterns. Like someone mentioned here before, if you have bigger, stronger, more athletic guys then your football teams probably better than most. Polynesians (Hawaiian, Samoan, Tongans) seem to fit that category pretty well so it’s no surprise with Laie side, Waianae side doing great and Kalihi having a decent showing.

Then there’s the fact that those outside of town are overall better in football. My personal opinion is that these places outside of town historically have been more rugged places compared to most parts of town, so kids there play outside more often. Many kids outside of townie areas have ancestry that gives them good physicality when it comes to strength and athleticism. It’s stereotyping but “Townies” seem to have ancestry with less physical and athletic genes and also without more social norms of playing outside. There’s always outliers, but for the most part I feel this is true.
@Jacob Makaiwi: Overall, I would agree with your theory. It's very politically incorrect, but, let's face it: Town schools often don't have adequate numbers of the physical specimens necessary to kick butt in football. I think, however, that you might re-consider McKinley High. Yes, they're only in D2, but that school has some big boys. In fact, I'd say they have more than just a few. I suspect that that's because MWH (and, to a lesser extent, Lanakila Homes) are in McKinley High's district. McKinley HC Kale Ane, I think, has a lot of experience in recruiting. Word has it that for many years while he was Punahou HC, he had been recruiting Polys, especially from Kahuku High. At McKinley High, he doesn't have to raid other schools; there's a gold mine of size and talent from MWH, especially. What sucks for him is that he'll have to compete with Cal Lee at St Louis School. Cal has been raiding MWH for decades, and Kale might not be able to compete with him because McKinley High is only D2. Naturally, kids would rather play for an Open school than a D2 school. I mean; it's a slam dunk, right? Poor Kale. All he can do is go after the boys that for whatever reason weren't caught in St Louis School's net. Funny how kids in the projects seem to get real big. That seems to be true of all projects throughout Oahu.

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

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Jacob Makaiwi wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 1:19 am But other than good genes and culture of playing outside a lot, there’s also coaching and Football culture. Coaching can make a huge difference. At Leilehua for example a coach named Nolan Tokuda was the head coach from 2004-2016.
Leilehua had good runs in the 70s and 80s, but were horrible in the 90s and beginning of the 2000s.
In 2003 the team went 3-5.
When Tokuda took over the very next year in 2004 they went 10-4 and made it all the way to the State championship game. He then brought the Mules to 2 more state championships and won once. The Mules were a great team and a good team after he started coaching them. Side note: (Coach Rod York used to coach at Leilehua under Tokuda).

It was the same town of Wahiawa. This was before OIA “recruiting” became a thing. But Coach Tokuda turned around the program from a losing one to a winning one. But what happens when you start having success? More people want to join in on the fun. More Wahiawa boys started getting excited and wanted to play for Leilehua. As a 11 year old boy playing tackle football in Wahiawa I went to the State Championship game with my family and watched Leilehua play. Of course it made me excited knowing my own town could make it to the big dance. And Going to Leilehua home games, seeing the crowd cheer, especially when your team wins is exhilarating. It makes you want to play for them. I don’t think the success at Leilehua in the 2000’s and early 2010’s was a coincidence. I believe coaching, winning, and success brought excitement and pride for Leilehua. And the Wahiawa boys looked forward to playing for the Mules when they got into high-school. Other than genetics it’s no wonder why Kahuku does so good. Their football has had so much success that the boys at a young age dream of also going to their own championship game one day and train super hard for it. I honestly feel Kahuku and Farrington (at least in the 2000’s and early 2010’s) are of the same physical makeup. But the winning tradition and culture for Kahuku has made them way more successful than Farrington. It’s just the culture. They’re just built different down Laie/Hauula, Kahuku side.

And now we are in the recruiting phase in public schools. As of the 2010s I believe it became a more common thing (kids living outside school boundaries claiming residency in it so they can play for them). Mililani is always an easy target for this example. But to be honest I think Coach York has built that program. And like St.Louis as of late, kids WANT to play for Mililani. So there is recruitment yeah, and he might have done some of that to make their program better at some point, but there’s also that excitement of playing for potentially the best team in the State and having all that success as an athlete. Shoot I’m pretty sure if Kahuku was closer to the other parts of the island plenty of kids wanting to win in football would also go there! A good friend of mine was a starting olineman on Kahuku’s football team even though he lived his whole life in the Castle district. He helped them win a State championship in 2011.

So Coach York built that excitement and that culture at Mililani. And he is a great coach! People may want to take that away from him because of the “recruiting”, but he’s a great coach because he has a great coaching mind and is really really invested in Mililani Football and in the players. I don’t blame kids for wanting to play for him. It’s not a coincidence that they’ve been to the OIA championship 8 times since 2010 (the year he became head coach)! I just wish he didn’t recruit as much to begin with and I just wish he stopped taking Wahiawa players that could play for Leilehua!! but it is what it is I guess.

So my guess is that genetics, the way you grow up (if plenty kids around you played outside), great Coaching, and winning Culture all play a huge part to Football success for each area on the island of Oahu.
@Jacob Makaiwi:

Well, I don't think anyone can argue with you about the importance of good coaching; that almost goes without saying.

What does bother me, though, is this idea that a school is all about the town it's located in. I mean, I think we should remember that not everyone who lives in Wahiawa, for example, is a Leilehua alumnus. You, for example are a Kamehameha alumnus. I don't know if you still live in Wahiawa, but obviously you did when you were younger, and obviously it made a great impression on you. I'd prefer that schools emphasize school culture rather than community culture. As much as possible, I'd prefer to see schools emphasize school community rather than geographic community. That way, alumni who move away from the surrounding community, don't feel irrelevant. For example, if there are any two Leilehua alumni, I'd prefer that they emphasize the fact that they both graduated from the same school, rather than the fact that they both are from Wahiawa (assuming that they are in fact both from Wahiawa). The same can be said for Kahuku High and Farrington High, I think. So, any two Kahuku alumni can emphasize the fact that they both graduated from the same school, rather than the fact (if it's true) that they both grew-up in Kahuku town. Any two Farrington alumni can emphasize the fact that they both graduated from the same school, rather than the fact that they both grew-up in Kalihi. I don't know, I just feel that the school itself should be the focus, not the surrounding community. Let the school community be the unifying factor. By "school community", I mean students and alumni of the school, without regard to where either live.

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

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ChadFukuoka wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 12:56 pm
Jacob Makaiwi wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 1:19 am But other than good genes and culture of playing outside a lot, there’s also coaching and Football culture. Coaching can make a huge difference. At Leilehua for example a coach named Nolan Tokuda was the head coach from 2004-2016.
Leilehua had good runs in the 70s and 80s, but were horrible in the 90s and beginning of the 2000s.
In 2003 the team went 3-5.
When Tokuda took over the very next year in 2004 they went 10-4 and made it all the way to the State championship game. He then brought the Mules to 2 more state championships and won once. The Mules were a great team and a good team after he started coaching them. Side note: (Coach Rod York used to coach at Leilehua under Tokuda).

It was the same town of Wahiawa. This was before OIA “recruiting” became a thing. But Coach Tokuda turned around the program from a losing one to a winning one. But what happens when you start having success? More people want to join in on the fun. More Wahiawa boys started getting excited and wanted to play for Leilehua. As a 11 year old boy playing tackle football in Wahiawa I went to the State Championship game with my family and watched Leilehua play. Of course it made me excited knowing my own town could make it to the big dance. And Going to Leilehua home games, seeing the crowd cheer, especially when your team wins is exhilarating. It makes you want to play for them. I don’t think the success at Leilehua in the 2000’s and early 2010’s was a coincidence. I believe coaching, winning, and success brought excitement and pride for Leilehua. And the Wahiawa boys looked forward to playing for the Mules when they got into high-school. Other than genetics it’s no wonder why Kahuku does so good. Their football has had so much success that the boys at a young age dream of also going to their own championship game one day and train super hard for it. I honestly feel Kahuku and Farrington (at least in the 2000’s and early 2010’s) are of the same physical makeup. But the winning tradition and culture for Kahuku has made them way more successful than Farrington. It’s just the culture. They’re just built different down Laie/Hauula, Kahuku side.

And now we are in the recruiting phase in public schools. As of the 2010s I believe it became a more common thing (kids living outside school boundaries claiming residency in it so they can play for them). Mililani is always an easy target for this example. But to be honest I think Coach York has built that program. And like St.Louis as of late, kids WANT to play for Mililani. So there is recruitment yeah, and he might have done some of that to make their program better at some point, but there’s also that excitement of playing for potentially the best team in the State and having all that success as an athlete. Shoot I’m pretty sure if Kahuku was closer to the other parts of the island plenty of kids wanting to win in football would also go there! A good friend of mine was a starting olineman on Kahuku’s football team even though he lived his whole life in the Castle district. He helped them win a State championship in 2011.

So Coach York built that excitement and that culture at Mililani. And he is a great coach! People may want to take that away from him because of the “recruiting”, but he’s a great coach because he has a great coaching mind and is really really invested in Mililani Football and in the players. I don’t blame kids for wanting to play for him. It’s not a coincidence that they’ve been to the OIA championship 8 times since 2010 (the year he became head coach)! I just wish he didn’t recruit as much to begin with and I just wish he stopped taking Wahiawa players that could play for Leilehua!! but it is what it is I guess.

So my guess is that genetics, the way you grow up (if plenty kids around you played outside), great Coaching, and winning Culture all play a huge part to Football success for each area on the island of Oahu.
Leilehua has still been successful in recent years. There is still a lot of hometown Wahaiwa pride. They haven’t been truly overshadowed by Mililani.

I’ve always kind of felt teams like Waialua and Nanakuli have been overshadowed by Kahuku and Waianae respectively. It must be nearly impossible to create a strong program at those two schools. Lower enrollment, being the “second” team in your geographical region, playing in Division 2 instead of the Open, less of a winning culture. It’s pretty amazing that Waialua was able to win a Division 2 OIA championship a few years ago.
@ChadFukuoka: And that's why an emphasis on school community can compensate. Waialua students and alumni can emphasize their common bond, and refuse to pay heed to Kahuku's football dominance. Nanakuli students and alumni can emphasize their common bond, and refuse to pay heed to Waianae's football dominance. Students and alumni can emphasize the school bond they share, and refuse to be
deflated by other schools. Let that bond stand in the gap, and drown-out other schools' "noise".

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

Post by ChadFukuoka »

HS Football Fanatic wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 7:47 pm
ChadFukuoka wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 12:56 pm
Jacob Makaiwi wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 1:19 am But other than good genes and culture of playing outside a lot, there’s also coaching and Football culture. Coaching can make a huge difference. At Leilehua for example a coach named Nolan Tokuda was the head coach from 2004-2016.
Leilehua had good runs in the 70s and 80s, but were horrible in the 90s and beginning of the 2000s.
In 2003 the team went 3-5.
When Tokuda took over the very next year in 2004 they went 10-4 and made it all the way to the State championship game. He then brought the Mules to 2 more state championships and won once. The Mules were a great team and a good team after he started coaching them. Side note: (Coach Rod York used to coach at Leilehua under Tokuda).

It was the same town of Wahiawa. This was before OIA “recruiting” became a thing. But Coach Tokuda turned around the program from a losing one to a winning one. But what happens when you start having success? More people want to join in on the fun. More Wahiawa boys started getting excited and wanted to play for Leilehua. As a 11 year old boy playing tackle football in Wahiawa I went to the State Championship game with my family and watched Leilehua play. Of course it made me excited knowing my own town could make it to the big dance. And Going to Leilehua home games, seeing the crowd cheer, especially when your team wins is exhilarating. It makes you want to play for them. I don’t think the success at Leilehua in the 2000’s and early 2010’s was a coincidence. I believe coaching, winning, and success brought excitement and pride for Leilehua. And the Wahiawa boys looked forward to playing for the Mules when they got into high-school. Other than genetics it’s no wonder why Kahuku does so good. Their football has had so much success that the boys at a young age dream of also going to their own championship game one day and train super hard for it. I honestly feel Kahuku and Farrington (at least in the 2000’s and early 2010’s) are of the same physical makeup. But the winning tradition and culture for Kahuku has made them way more successful than Farrington. It’s just the culture. They’re just built different down Laie/Hauula, Kahuku side.

And now we are in the recruiting phase in public schools. As of the 2010s I believe it became a more common thing (kids living outside school boundaries claiming residency in it so they can play for them). Mililani is always an easy target for this example. But to be honest I think Coach York has built that program. And like St.Louis as of late, kids WANT to play for Mililani. So there is recruitment yeah, and he might have done some of that to make their program better at some point, but there’s also that excitement of playing for potentially the best team in the State and having all that success as an athlete. Shoot I’m pretty sure if Kahuku was closer to the other parts of the island plenty of kids wanting to win in football would also go there! A good friend of mine was a starting olineman on Kahuku’s football team even though he lived his whole life in the Castle district. He helped them win a State championship in 2011.

So Coach York built that excitement and that culture at Mililani. And he is a great coach! People may want to take that away from him because of the “recruiting”, but he’s a great coach because he has a great coaching mind and is really really invested in Mililani Football and in the players. I don’t blame kids for wanting to play for him. It’s not a coincidence that they’ve been to the OIA championship 8 times since 2010 (the year he became head coach)! I just wish he didn’t recruit as much to begin with and I just wish he stopped taking Wahiawa players that could play for Leilehua!! but it is what it is I guess.

So my guess is that genetics, the way you grow up (if plenty kids around you played outside), great Coaching, and winning Culture all play a huge part to Football success for each area on the island of Oahu.
Leilehua has still been successful in recent years. There is still a lot of hometown Wahaiwa pride. They haven’t been truly overshadowed by Mililani.

I’ve always kind of felt teams like Waialua and Nanakuli have been overshadowed by Kahuku and Waianae respectively. It must be nearly impossible to create a strong program at those two schools. Lower enrollment, being the “second” team in your geographical region, playing in Division 2 instead of the Open, less of a winning culture. It’s pretty amazing that Waialua was able to win a Division 2 OIA championship a few years ago.
@ChadFukuoka: And that's why an emphasis on school community can compensate. Waialua students and alumni can emphasize their common bond, and refuse to pay heed to Kahuku's football dominance. Nanakuli students and alumni can emphasize their common bond, and refuse to pay heed to Waianae's football dominance. Students and alumni can emphasize the school bond they share, and refuse to be
deflated by other schools.
The problem for both Waialua and Nanakuli has been low roster sizes and program support. I’d imagine not just in sports, but overall enrollment is less at Waialua and Nanakuli, than Kahuku and Waianae.

It seems like a lot of decent youth players are flocking to Kahuku or Waianae. Both Waialua and Nanakuli have low turnout every year, and often struggle to or don’t field JV teams. So the pipeline of getting players from the youth level to the high school varsity level isn’t as strong as it needs to be.

There not as much an alumni can do for the football program, besides being a fan. Most alumni can’t be on the coaching staff. The problem can be solved with the students and parents, who either need to turn out for the team in higher numbers, get involved with the local youth teams at a earlier age, or as parents, become involved with the team in some way. Even D2 champions are still champions, and the best in a league of around 8 or 9 teams. There’s still something to compete for. Not every team can or should be in Open.

I’d guess it’s a grassroots problem. It’s hard to turn around a non-winning culture. It’s also hard to win with smaller rosters, school enrollment, and community population. Mililani and Campbell were bad for a while, and playing in either D2, or in Mililani’s case in the 70’s and 80’s, I think either white or blue as the lowest division. But those two programs have experienced population booms, in their respective towns, so there are larger talent pools for those teams to develop players. The Nanakuli or Haleiwa areas won’t be experiencing that, (lack of open space, or new housing developments) so how do those schools improve their talent pool?

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

Post by Jacob Makaiwi »

@HS football fanatic. I’m just trying to answer the original question trying to correlate geographic region on island to football success. That’s why I purposely focused on OIA schools through history because I feel it can reflect geographic area’s football success.

Those are great thoughts and I agree with you! People should be proud of the school that they went to. As a Kamehameha alumnus I’m very very proud of Kamehameha and my friends from Kamehameha schools are still strong and our bond brings us back to our Alma mater. Private school is hard but I’m grateful for it and I owe lots of my life blessings to Kamehameha schools.

Little bit about me. I lived in wahiawa from birth to 12, made it into Kamehameha Schools in 7th grade. My family moved in with extended family in Pearl City and as a 12 year old I was devastated and missed Wahiawa a lot. Life went on, I lived in various places on island including Laie for college. Married my wife from Hauula and moved back to Wahiawa where we hope to stay and raise our family.

Not too many people in Hawaii stay where they grew up, but many that I know that have moved away are still proud of the town they grew up in. Public schools are just an extension of the community people are from. As a Kamehameha student most of my classmates were proud of their communities and the public schools that represented their towns. For example the Kalihi guys would rep Farrington, North Shore boys would rep Kahuku High, West Side boys would rep Waianae High, Waipahu guys rep Waipahu. All Kam students, but proud of their communities and the schools that represent them. I’m just one of those guys that happens to really love Wahiawa and Hawaii High School football and Leilehua is an extension of that love for myself.

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

Post by poidog »

HS Football Fanatic wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 7:09 pm
Jacob Makaiwi wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 1:18 am The teams with least success would be the “townies” stretching from Pearl City east through Honolulu and ending in Hawaii Kai area. Kalihi would be the only big outlier. But pretty much in overall history if you’re outside of town specifically in Waianae, Laie side, Central Oahu, or East side things have been great or pretty good. Times have changed with different schools being “weaker” but it seems consistently “weak” with the “townie” teams. And there’s been a huge push in central Oahu, specifically Mililani. It’s no secret that they have players living outside of their boundaries, but they have success nonetheless.

So looking at this you just have to see logistics, demographics, patterns. Like someone mentioned here before, if you have bigger, stronger, more athletic guys then your football teams probably better than most. Polynesians (Hawaiian, Samoan, Tongans) seem to fit that category pretty well so it’s no surprise with Laie side, Waianae side doing great and Kalihi having a decent showing.

Then there’s the fact that those outside of town are overall better in football. My personal opinion is that these places outside of town historically have been more rugged places compared to most parts of town, so kids there play outside more often. Many kids outside of townie areas have ancestry that gives them good physicality when it comes to strength and athleticism. It’s stereotyping but “Townies” seem to have ancestry with less physical and athletic genes and also without more social norms of playing outside. There’s always outliers, but for the most part I feel this is true.
@Jacob Makaiwi: Overall, I would agree with your theory. It's very politically incorrect, but, let's face it: Town schools often don't have adequate numbers of the physical specimens necessary to kick butt in football. I think, however, that you might re-consider McKinley High. Yes, they're only in D2, but that school has some big boys. In fact, I'd say they have more than just a few. I suspect that that's because MWH (and, to a lesser extent, Lanakila Homes) are in McKinley High's district. McKinley HC Kale Ane, I think, has a lot of experience in recruiting. Word has it that for many years while he was Punahou HC, he had been recruiting Polys, especially from Kahuku High. At McKinley High, he doesn't have to raid other schools; there's a gold mine of size and talent from MWH, especially. What sucks for him is that he'll have to compete with Cal Lee at St Louis School. Cal has been raiding MWH for decades, and Kale might not be able to compete with him because McKinley High is only D2. Naturally, kids would rather play for an Open school than a D2 school. I mean; it's a slam dunk, right? Poor Kale. All he can do is go after the boys that for whatever reason weren't caught in St Louis School's net. Funny how kids in the projects seem to get real big. That seems to be true of all projects throughout Oahu.
I don't think this theory is politically incorrect as much as it is flat-out incorrect.

Mililani is basically a townie school outside of town with a popular coach and a large student body. Do kids get tough by running the mean streets of Mililani? not really. Mililani is probably higher class today than 25 years ago, and their football team was not good 25 years ago. They have one school for a huge area and a large pool of talent to draw from, they have a rockstar coach, and kids from out of district want to play there. the only non-townie thing about Mililani High is that there isn't another high school on the other side of town to split the talent in half. Mililani has 2600 students

Ewa Beach is also higher class today than it was 25 years ago - places like rough & tumble Hoakalei and Ocean Pointe did not yet exist. Yet, they are also way better today than before. things happen when you have 3000 students to draw talent from.

Moanalua is kind of a townie school (though they were in the OIA West for many years) but they've been decent at football for a while now. They have about 2000 students.

Farrington is the outlier in your theory because while being in town they are considered to be "tough" because they have the genetics... but is that the reason?

Kaimuki has a population of polynesian students, so why are they not as good as Farrington? Because Kaimuki High has less than 700 students and Farrington has around 2400 students. Kaimuki has the same kind of athletes as the country schools you mention, but they don't have enough of them because they don't have enough students in general. This is also true for other town schools. town schools have smaller campuses in closer proximity to other high schools and have less students in general. there's a reason why Mililani and Campbell hold their graduation ceremonies at Aloha Stadium while town schools hold theirs at small venues like the Blaisedell Concert Hall.

Kailua has a good mix of kids from Waimanalo, but why aren't they consistently better at football? Probably because they only have 800 students. Kalaheo has access to military kids, so why aren't they as good as Leilehua? probably because they have about 800 students as well. What if Kailua and Kalaheo were combined into one central school the way Mililani is? I bet they'd be better at football, for one thing.

Perhaps we should have looked at the enrollment numbers on the first page of this thread - it would have steered the conversation a different way.

Lastly, town schools are the hardest hit by the private school talent drain. there's the natural pipeline of income-based decisions to attend Punahou or Iolani instead of Kalani or Kaiser. Then, there's the athletics-based "financial aid" that gets offered to students before they hit high school. Country kids supposedly play outside more, but townie kids have access to WAY MORE organized sports and clinics, and these places are hotbeds for coaches from private schools and club teams looking to recruit talent. and these organized sports don't even have to be football for it to affect football. that 5'9" 7th grade power forward that gets recruited to play hoops for Maryknoll could have very well been starting left tackle for Roosevelt in a few years. this stuff happens all the time, and if you grew up as an athlete in town you've seen it first-hand.

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

Post by Jacob Makaiwi »

poidog wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 11:12 pm
HS Football Fanatic wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 7:09 pm
Jacob Makaiwi wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 1:18 am The teams with least success would be the “townies” stretching from Pearl City east through Honolulu and ending in Hawaii Kai area. Kalihi would be the only big outlier. But pretty much in overall history if you’re outside of town specifically in Waianae, Laie side, Central Oahu, or East side things have been great or pretty good. Times have changed with different schools being “weaker” but it seems consistently “weak” with the “townie” teams. And there’s been a huge push in central Oahu, specifically Mililani. It’s no secret that they have players living outside of their boundaries, but they have success nonetheless.

So looking at this you just have to see logistics, demographics, patterns. Like someone mentioned here before, if you have bigger, stronger, more athletic guys then your football teams probably better than most. Polynesians (Hawaiian, Samoan, Tongans) seem to fit that category pretty well so it’s no surprise with Laie side, Waianae side doing great and Kalihi having a decent showing.

Then there’s the fact that those outside of town are overall better in football. My personal opinion is that these places outside of town historically have been more rugged places compared to most parts of town, so kids there play outside more often. Many kids outside of townie areas have ancestry that gives them good physicality when it comes to strength and athleticism. It’s stereotyping but “Townies” seem to have ancestry with less physical and athletic genes and also without more social norms of playing outside. There’s always outliers, but for the most part I feel this is true.
@Jacob Makaiwi: Overall, I would agree with your theory. It's very politically incorrect, but, let's face it: Town schools often don't have adequate numbers of the physical specimens necessary to kick butt in football. I think, however, that you might re-consider McKinley High. Yes, they're only in D2, but that school has some big boys. In fact, I'd say they have more than just a few. I suspect that that's because MWH (and, to a lesser extent, Lanakila Homes) are in McKinley High's district. McKinley HC Kale Ane, I think, has a lot of experience in recruiting. Word has it that for many years while he was Punahou HC, he had been recruiting Polys, especially from Kahuku High. At McKinley High, he doesn't have to raid other schools; there's a gold mine of size and talent from MWH, especially. What sucks for him is that he'll have to compete with Cal Lee at St Louis School. Cal has been raiding MWH for decades, and Kale might not be able to compete with him because McKinley High is only D2. Naturally, kids would rather play for an Open school than a D2 school. I mean; it's a slam dunk, right? Poor Kale. All he can do is go after the boys that for whatever reason weren't caught in St Louis School's net. Funny how kids in the projects seem to get real big. That seems to be true of all projects throughout Oahu.
I don't think this theory is politically incorrect as much as it is flat-out incorrect.

Mililani is basically a townie school outside of town with a popular coach and a large student body. Do kids get tough by running the mean streets of Mililani? not really. Mililani is probably higher class today than 25 years ago, and their football team was not good 25 years ago. They have one school for a huge area and a large pool of talent to draw from, they have a rockstar coach, and kids from out of district want to play there. the only non-townie thing about Mililani High is that there isn't another high school on the other side of town to split the talent in half. Mililani has 2600 students

Ewa Beach is also higher class today than it was 25 years ago - places like rough & tumble Hoakalei and Ocean Pointe did not yet exist. Yet, they are also way better today than before. things happen when you have 3000 students to draw talent from.

Moanalua is kind of a townie school (though they were in the OIA West for many years) but they've been decent at football for a while now. They have about 2000 students.

Farrington is the outlier in your theory because while being in town they are considered to be "tough" because they have the genetics... but is that the reason?

Kaimuki has a population of polynesian students, so why are they not as good as Farrington? Because Kaimuki High has less than 700 students and Farrington has around 2400 students. Kaimuki has the same kind of athletes as the country schools you mention, but they don't have enough of them because they don't have enough students in general. This is also true for other town schools. town schools have smaller campuses in closer proximity to other high schools and have less students in general. there's a reason why Mililani and Campbell hold their graduation ceremonies at Aloha Stadium while town schools hold theirs at small venues like the Blaisedell Concert Hall.

Kailua has a good mix of kids from Waimanalo, but why aren't they consistently better at football? Probably because they only have 800 students. Kalaheo has access to military kids, so why aren't they as good as Leilehua? probably because they have about 800 students as well. What if Kailua and Kalaheo were combined into one central school the way Mililani is? I bet they'd be better at football, for one thing.

Perhaps we should have looked at the enrollment numbers on the first page of this thread - it would have steered the conversation a different way.

Lastly, town schools are the hardest hit by the private school talent drain. there's the natural pipeline of income-based decisions to attend Punahou or Iolani instead of Kalani or Kaiser. Then, there's the athletics-based "financial aid" that gets offered to students before they hit high school. Country kids supposedly play outside more, but townie kids have access to WAY MORE organized sports and clinics, and these places are hotbeds for coaches from private schools and club teams looking to recruit talent. and these organized sports don't even have to be football for it to affect football. that 5'9" 7th grade power forward that gets recruited to play hoops for Maryknoll could have very well been starting left tackle for Roosevelt in a few years. this stuff happens all the time, and if you grew up as an athlete in town you've seen it first-hand.
Great points man! Thank you for bringing up those awesome points. Sorry that my theories were really wrong about town football success. I have info on enrollment below as well.

“Townies” that I previously mentioned was from Pearl City Through to Hawaii Kai based off location (Pear City/Aiea/city of Honolulu from Halawa to Hawaii Kai) not vibe, commodities, or style of living. I only have my limited perspective and I moved from Wahiawa (what I consider more country) to Pearl City (what I consider Town side) so I’ve seen that different lifestyle amongst youth between the 2 towns and I stereotyped Pearl City for a lot of town areas. So sorry again man and thanks for opening up my perspective!

I agree 100% with you that Mililani is way more “townie” although it’s not in what I consider town side in location. That’s my next door neighbor and it is so so different from Wahiawa. Like you said, I should have been more focused on enrollment in this theory! That does make a huge difference. Yes there’s been exponentially larger enrollments for high schools lately. More specifically schools west of town side like Mililani, Waipahu, Campbell, and Kapolei. And the definite increase has happened in more recent decades.

So if we’re basing it off enrollment you’re very right. I only can personally compare from 2000’s on because I was born in ‘93. But I wonder how much enrollment has changed between the ‘70s til the 2000’s for all these Public schools because I also tried to use the all time history of the OIA championship appearance (in the Highest tier of each year) to theorize football success in towns on Oahu and sub sections of Honolulu (“townies”). I wonder which schools enrollment increased and decreased from all Oahu towns and subsections of Honolulu from the ‘70s to now?

Waianae and Kahuku still take the cake in all time OIA appearances in OIA championships. I lived down in Laie/Hauula for about 3 years. The community is tiny. Laie, Kahuku, and Hauula make up majority of the players for the Kahuku football team. And their population is only about 12,000 at most between those 3 towns. Kaneohe Population is 33,000. Wahiawa town is 17,000. And Pearl City is 45,000 if we’re trying to get some comparisons. But yeah Kahuku football is small in community and in enrollment, but has the best success. So small enrollment size is definitely not stopping that teams success.

Oahu High Schools enrollment. This should all be from the ‘20 grad year. Unless * then it’s from the ‘18 grad year.

Here’s enrollment number by schools that I recently tried to find out that were either from the year 2020 or the year 2018*
* For schools that were combined (high&inter) I divided total enrollment of that whole school by 6 and multiplied by 4 to guesstimate their possible high school enrollment. Those schools have parenthesis at the end with the total enrollment from grades 7-12.

Oahu Public Schools
Lowest enrollment to highest
1. Waialua = 430^ (645)
2. Kaimuki= 688
3. Nanakuli= 688* (1,032)
4. Kailua= 802
5. Kalaheo= 813
6. Kahuku= 900 (1,351)
7. Aiea= 997*
8. Kaiser= 1,141*
9. Castle= 1,173*
10. Radford= 1,275*
11. Roosevelt= 1,363*
12. Kalani= 1,383*
13. Pearl City= 1,591
14. Leilehua= 1,645
15. McKinley= 1,663
16. Waianae= 1,762
17. Moanalua= 1,942*
18. Kapolei= 1,946
19. Farrington= 2,396
20. Mililani= 2,620
21. Waipahu= 2,777
22. Campbell= 3,077

Most teams with recent football success have been those in the top half of schools with most enrollment other than McKinley, Pearl City, and Kalani. And Kahuku is the only one in the bottom half with much football success. There is quite a spike of enrollment towards the end of this list.


So much to think about. I will repent and take away my theory of townies in general not having genetics and play that helps with football success compared to other parts of the island. I will also add that if I’m counting public schools for this theory that enrollment makes a huge difference and can make it hard to determine football success by geographic location on island, especially with lumps of schools next to each other with smaller enrollments. But I will keep with my theory of genetics, coaching, and culture of winning. Geographically on the island, the area near Kahuku consistently has success because they always have the genetics, almost always have great coaches at the high school there, and almost always have a culture of winning despite them being one of the schools with the smallest high school enrollment on the island.

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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

Post by HS Football Fanatic »

poidog wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 11:12 pm
HS Football Fanatic wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 7:09 pm
Jacob Makaiwi wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 1:18 am The teams with least success would be the “townies” stretching from Pearl City east through Honolulu and ending in Hawaii Kai area. Kalihi would be the only big outlier. But pretty much in overall history if you’re outside of town specifically in Waianae, Laie side, Central Oahu, or East side things have been great or pretty good. Times have changed with different schools being “weaker” but it seems consistently “weak” with the “townie” teams. And there’s been a huge push in central Oahu, specifically Mililani. It’s no secret that they have players living outside of their boundaries, but they have success nonetheless.

So looking at this you just have to see logistics, demographics, patterns. Like someone mentioned here before, if you have bigger, stronger, more athletic guys then your football teams probably better than most. Polynesians (Hawaiian, Samoan, Tongans) seem to fit that category pretty well so it’s no surprise with Laie side, Waianae side doing great and Kalihi having a decent showing.

Then there’s the fact that those outside of town are overall better in football. My personal opinion is that these places outside of town historically have been more rugged places compared to most parts of town, so kids there play outside more often. Many kids outside of townie areas have ancestry that gives them good physicality when it comes to strength and athleticism. It’s stereotyping but “Townies” seem to have ancestry with less physical and athletic genes and also without more social norms of playing outside. There’s always outliers, but for the most part I feel this is true.
@Jacob Makaiwi: Overall, I would agree with your theory. It's very politically incorrect, but, let's face it: Town schools often don't have adequate numbers of the physical specimens necessary to kick butt in football. I think, however, that you might re-consider McKinley High. Yes, they're only in D2, but that school has some big boys. In fact, I'd say they have more than just a few. I suspect that that's because MWH (and, to a lesser extent, Lanakila Homes) are in McKinley High's district. McKinley HC Kale Ane, I think, has a lot of experience in recruiting. Word has it that for many years while he was Punahou HC, he had been recruiting Polys, especially from Kahuku High. At McKinley High, he doesn't have to raid other schools; there's a gold mine of size and talent from MWH, especially. What sucks for him is that he'll have to compete with Cal Lee at St Louis School. Cal has been raiding MWH for decades, and Kale might not be able to compete with him because McKinley High is only D2. Naturally, kids would rather play for an Open school than a D2 school. I mean; it's a slam dunk, right? Poor Kale. All he can do is go after the boys that for whatever reason weren't caught in St Louis School's net. Funny how kids in the projects seem to get real big. That seems to be true of all projects throughout Oahu.
I don't think this theory is politically incorrect as much as it is flat-out incorrect.

Mililani is basically a townie school outside of town with a popular coach and a large student body. Do kids get tough by running the mean streets of Mililani? not really. Mililani is probably higher class today than 25 years ago, and their football team was not good 25 years ago. They have one school for a huge area and a large pool of talent to draw from, they have a rockstar coach, and kids from out of district want to play there. the only non-townie thing about Mililani High is that there isn't another high school on the other side of town to split the talent in half. Mililani has 2600 students

Ewa Beach is also higher class today than it was 25 years ago - places like rough & tumble Hoakalei and Ocean Pointe did not yet exist. Yet, they are also way better today than before. things happen when you have 3000 students to draw talent from.

Moanalua is kind of a townie school (though they were in the OIA West for many years) but they've been decent at football for a while now. They have about 2000 students.

Farrington is the outlier in your theory because while being in town they are considered to be "tough" because they have the genetics... but is that the reason?

Kaimuki has a population of polynesian students, so why are they not as good as Farrington? Because Kaimuki High has less than 700 students and Farrington has around 2400 students. Kaimuki has the same kind of athletes as the country schools you mention, but they don't have enough of them because they don't have enough students in general. This is also true for other town schools. town schools have smaller campuses in closer proximity to other high schools and have less students in general. there's a reason why Mililani and Campbell hold their graduation ceremonies at Aloha Stadium while town schools hold theirs at small venues like the Blaisedell Concert Hall.

Kailua has a good mix of kids from Waimanalo, but why aren't they consistently better at football? Probably because they only have 800 students. Kalaheo has access to military kids, so why aren't they as good as Leilehua? probably because they have about 800 students as well. What if Kailua and Kalaheo were combined into one central school the way Mililani is? I bet they'd be better at football, for one thing.

Perhaps we should have looked at the enrollment numbers on the first page of this thread - it would have steered the conversation a different way.

Lastly, town schools are the hardest hit by the private school talent drain. there's the natural pipeline of income-based decisions to attend Punahou or Iolani instead of Kalani or Kaiser. Then, there's the athletics-based "financial aid" that gets offered to students before they hit high school. Country kids supposedly play outside more, but townie kids have access to WAY MORE organized sports and clinics, and these places are hotbeds for coaches from private schools and club teams looking to recruit talent. and these organized sports don't even have to be football for it to affect football. that 5'9" 7th grade power forward that gets recruited to play hoops for Maryknoll could have very well been starting left tackle for Roosevelt in a few years. this stuff happens all the time, and if you grew up as an athlete in town you've seen it first-hand.
@poidog:
1. I don't think you can classify Mililani High as a "townie school", even though its geographic district is more "gentrified" than other rural areas. And, let me tell you why: I know a "townie" teacher who used to teach at Leilehua High, and the students there called him a townie. Mililani High was founded after Leilehua High, and draws kids from areas that used to be in Leilehua High's district. Seeing as Mililani High now draws kids from areas that were once part of Leilehua High's district, I doubt that Mililani High students see themselves as "townies"; I think that's very unlikely. Therefore, I would suggest that it isn't the level of "gentrification" that creates a "townie" identity or mentality; it's how far that school is, geographically, from Honolulu proper.

2. Ewa Beach is perhaps more gentrified than it was, say, thirty years ago, and yes: That would be due to the new, gentrified "townhouse"-type developments than have sprung-up in that area over the past thirty years. But, you still have those typically rural-style, more rough-and-tumble areas of Ewa Beach that Campbell High still draws students from. And, I'm sure there's no way that anyone would characterize Campbell High as a more "genteel" school today, despite all those more-gentrified homes and townhouses that have sprung-up over the past thirty years. And, yes, Campbell High is a very large high school in terms of numbers. In fact, it's the largest public high school on the island. Another indication that Campbell High isn't as "gentrified" as we might think, is that it has the highest number of COVID cases of any public high school on the island. That is distinctly a West Oahu phenomenon (higher COVID rates).

3. Moanalua High isn't just kind of a townie school; it is a townie school, and always was. Don't let the fact that it was long a part of the OIA's West division, fool you. It was long a part of Oahu West only because it was in the DOE's Central District. In fact, Moanalua High is on the western fringe of Honolulu proper. That's why it's now in the OIA's East division; when Kapolei High (Oahu's newest public high school) entered OIA athletics at about 2003 or so, that's when Moanalua High got bumped into the OIA East division.

4. I think I explained in my earlier post, why Farrington High is an "outlier", as you put it. At the risk of sounding politically incorrect, Farrington High includes in its geographic area both KPT and Kam IV. And even outside of those projects, Kalihi--the school's geographic area--is generally tough to begin with. In addition, Farrington High has a large enrollment; it's the third-largest public high school on the island, if I recall correctly, behind Campbell High and Waipahu High.

5. Yes, Kaimuki High's biggest problem is that its enrollment has shrunk drastically over the past ten to fifteen years. However, the school also has Palolo Homes in its district, and--like most housing projects--Palolo Homes has some big kids. In fact, if I recall correctly, Kaimuki High had the biggest O-line in the state--yes, bigger even than St Louis School's--in 2000 or so. But, Palolo Homes has been in Kaimuki High's district for forever, even back in the mid-'70s, when the school had a much-larger enrollment. Yet, they weren't that strong in football even back then.

6. When it comes to Kailua High, don't make the mistake of thinking that a smaller enrollment necessarily translates into "not being consistently better at football." First off, Kailua High never sucked in football, as far as I can remember. And, in '87, Kailua High had a massive, fearsome O-line that even St Louis School's D-line didn't want to play. Now, if you know how good St Louis School's D-lines were, back in them late-'80s, you know that they feared almost no one. But, in '87, they feared Kailua High's O-line. One of the dailies--there were two back then--even ran a feature of their O-line in the sports page, along with a large photo of them. And, how do I know that St Louis School's D-line feared Kailua High's O-line? I knew some of those O-linemen (I was much younger back then, and closer to high school athletic circles) and the info got back to them via the "coconut wireless". Again, one of the dailies ran a story on that O-line, complete with a large photo. It wasn't until 22 years later that another O-line got the same coverage, complete with large photo. That was Kamehameha Schools' O-line in '09, when the Warriors won the D1 State title. That O-line wasn't quite as big as that earlier massive Kailua High O-line, but it was every bit as good. Again, Kamehameha Schools won the D1 State title that year.

7. So, where are we thus far? Enrollment certainly does play a role, but it is not necessarily conclusive. It takes only so many players to form an O-line. If any school is lucky enough in any given year to happen to have five huge, talented players, it can have a formidable O-line.

8. To be sure, town high schools get hit the hardest by private school recruitment, for the simple reason that all the power private schools are in town: St Louis School, Punahou School. (I'm not counting Kamehameha Schools, because you have to have Hawaiian blood to go there, and not all great athletes have Hawaiian blood). However, that doesn't stop St Louis School and Punahou School from recruiting far beyond the city limits. Punahou School is probably the more notorious for this: Under former HC Kale Ane, the school had raided quite a few players from Kahuku High; so many, in fact, that some guys called Punahou School, "Kahuku South".

ChadFukuoka
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Re: What makes some areas of Oahu/neighbor islands more successful at football than others?

Post by ChadFukuoka »

HS Football Fanatic wrote: Fri Oct 08, 2021 6:59 pm
poidog wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 11:12 pm
HS Football Fanatic wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 7:09 pm

@Jacob Makaiwi: Overall, I would agree with your theory. It's very politically incorrect, but, let's face it: Town schools often don't have adequate numbers of the physical specimens necessary to kick butt in football. I think, however, that you might re-consider McKinley High. Yes, they're only in D2, but that school has some big boys. In fact, I'd say they have more than just a few. I suspect that that's because MWH (and, to a lesser extent, Lanakila Homes) are in McKinley High's district. McKinley HC Kale Ane, I think, has a lot of experience in recruiting. Word has it that for many years while he was Punahou HC, he had been recruiting Polys, especially from Kahuku High. At McKinley High, he doesn't have to raid other schools; there's a gold mine of size and talent from MWH, especially. What sucks for him is that he'll have to compete with Cal Lee at St Louis School. Cal has been raiding MWH for decades, and Kale might not be able to compete with him because McKinley High is only D2. Naturally, kids would rather play for an Open school than a D2 school. I mean; it's a slam dunk, right? Poor Kale. All he can do is go after the boys that for whatever reason weren't caught in St Louis School's net. Funny how kids in the projects seem to get real big. That seems to be true of all projects throughout Oahu.
I don't think this theory is politically incorrect as much as it is flat-out incorrect.

Mililani is basically a townie school outside of town with a popular coach and a large student body. Do kids get tough by running the mean streets of Mililani? not really. Mililani is probably higher class today than 25 years ago, and their football team was not good 25 years ago. They have one school for a huge area and a large pool of talent to draw from, they have a rockstar coach, and kids from out of district want to play there. the only non-townie thing about Mililani High is that there isn't another high school on the other side of town to split the talent in half. Mililani has 2600 students

Ewa Beach is also higher class today than it was 25 years ago - places like rough & tumble Hoakalei and Ocean Pointe did not yet exist. Yet, they are also way better today than before. things happen when you have 3000 students to draw talent from.

Moanalua is kind of a townie school (though they were in the OIA West for many years) but they've been decent at football for a while now. They have about 2000 students.

Farrington is the outlier in your theory because while being in town they are considered to be "tough" because they have the genetics... but is that the reason?

Kaimuki has a population of polynesian students, so why are they not as good as Farrington? Because Kaimuki High has less than 700 students and Farrington has around 2400 students. Kaimuki has the same kind of athletes as the country schools you mention, but they don't have enough of them because they don't have enough students in general. This is also true for other town schools. town schools have smaller campuses in closer proximity to other high schools and have less students in general. there's a reason why Mililani and Campbell hold their graduation ceremonies at Aloha Stadium while town schools hold theirs at small venues like the Blaisedell Concert Hall.

Kailua has a good mix of kids from Waimanalo, but why aren't they consistently better at football? Probably because they only have 800 students. Kalaheo has access to military kids, so why aren't they as good as Leilehua? probably because they have about 800 students as well. What if Kailua and Kalaheo were combined into one central school the way Mililani is? I bet they'd be better at football, for one thing.

Perhaps we should have looked at the enrollment numbers on the first page of this thread - it would have steered the conversation a different way.

Lastly, town schools are the hardest hit by the private school talent drain. there's the natural pipeline of income-based decisions to attend Punahou or Iolani instead of Kalani or Kaiser. Then, there's the athletics-based "financial aid" that gets offered to students before they hit high school. Country kids supposedly play outside more, but townie kids have access to WAY MORE organized sports and clinics, and these places are hotbeds for coaches from private schools and club teams looking to recruit talent. and these organized sports don't even have to be football for it to affect football. that 5'9" 7th grade power forward that gets recruited to play hoops for Maryknoll could have very well been starting left tackle for Roosevelt in a few years. this stuff happens all the time, and if you grew up as an athlete in town you've seen it first-hand.
@poidog:
1. I don't think you can classify Mililani High as a "townie school", even though its geographic district is more "gentrified" than other rural areas. And, let me tell you why: I know a "townie" teacher who used to teach at Leilehua High, and the students there called him a townie. Mililani High was founded after Leilehua High, and draws kids from areas that used to be in Leilehua High's district. Seeing as Mililani High now draws kids from areas that were once part of Leilehua High's district, I doubt that Mililani High students see themselves as "townies"; I think that's very unlikely. Therefore, I would suggest that it isn't the level of "gentrification" that creates a "townie" identity or mentality; it's how far that school is, geographically, from Honolulu proper.

2. Ewa Beach is perhaps more gentrified than it was, say, thirty years ago, and yes: That would be due to the new, gentrified "townhouse"-type developments than have sprung-up in that area over the past thirty years. But, you still have those typically rural-style, more rough-and-tumble areas of Ewa Beach that Campbell High still draws students from. And, I'm sure there's no way that anyone would characterize Campbell High as a more "genteel" school today, despite all those more-gentrified homes and townhouses that have sprung-up over the past thirty years. And, yes, Campbell High is a very large high school in terms of numbers. In fact, it's the largest public high school on the island. Another indication that Campbell High isn't as "gentrified" as we might think, is that it has the highest number of COVID cases of any public high school on the island. That is distinctly a West Oahu phenomenon (higher COVID rates).

3. Moanalua High isn't just kind of a townie school; it is a townie school, and always was. Don't let the fact that it was long a part of the OIA's West division, fool you. It was long a part of Oahu West only because it was in the DOE's Central District. In fact, Moanalua High is on the western fringe of Honolulu proper. That's why it's now in the OIA's East division; when Kapolei High (Oahu's newest public high school) entered OIA athletics at about 2003 or so, that's when Moanalua High got bumped into the OIA East division.

4. I think I explained in my earlier post, why Farrington High is an "outlier", as you put it. At the risk of sounding politically incorrect, Farrington High includes in its geographic area both KPT and Kam IV. And even outside of those projects, Kalihi--the school's geographic area--is generally tough to begin with. In addition, Farrington High has a large enrollment; it's the third-largest public high school on the island, if I recall correctly, behind Campbell High and Waipahu High.

5. Yes, Kaimuki High's biggest problem is that its enrollment has shrunk drastically over the past ten to fifteen years. However, the school also has Palolo Homes in its district, and--like most housing projects--Palolo Homes has some big kids. In fact, if I recall correctly, Kaimuki High had the biggest O-line in the state--yes, bigger even than St Louis School's--in 2000 or so. But, Palolo Homes has been in Kaimuki High's district for forever, even back in the mid-'70s, when the school had a much-larger enrollment. Yet, they weren't that strong in football even back then.

6. When it comes to Kailua High, don't make the mistake of thinking that a smaller enrollment necessarily translates into "not being consistently better at football." First off, Kailua High never sucked in football, as far as I can remember. And, in '87, Kailua High had a massive, fearsome O-line that even St Louis School's D-line didn't want to play. Now, if you know how good St Louis School's D-lines were, back in them late-'80s, you know that they feared almost no one. But, in '87, they feared Kailua High's O-line. One of the dailies--there were two back then--even ran a feature of their O-line in the sports page, along with a large photo of them. And, how do I know that St Louis School's D-line feared Kailua High's O-line? I knew some of those O-linemen (I was much younger back then, and closer to high school athletic circles) and the info got back to them via the "coconut wireless". Again, one of the dailies ran a story on that O-line, complete with a large photo. It wasn't until 22 years later that another O-line got the same coverage, complete with large photo. That was Kamehameha Schools' O-line in '09, when the Warriors won the D1 State title. That O-line wasn't quite as big as that earlier massive Kailua High O-line, but it was every bit as good. Again, Kamehameha Schools won the D1 State title that year.

7. So, where are we thus far? Enrollment certainly does play a role, but it is not necessarily conclusive. It takes only so many players to form an O-line. If any school is lucky enough in any given year to happen to have five huge, talented players, it can have a formidable O-line.

8. To be sure, town high schools get hit the hardest by private school recruitment, for the simple reason that all the power private schools are in town: St Louis School, Punahou School. (I'm not counting Kamehameha Schools, because you have to have Hawaiian blood to go there, and not all great athletes have Hawaiian blood). However, that doesn't stop St Louis School and Punahou School from recruiting far beyond the city limits. Punahou School is probably the more notorious for this: Under former HC Kale Ane, the school had raided quite a few players from Kahuku High; so many, in fact, that some guys called Punahou School, "Kahuku South".

Mililani isn’t “townie”, it’s suburbia. The layout of the neighborhoods, especially the Mauka area, is your typical mainland suburban vibe. Upper middle class, quiet, peaceful, relatively clean, sleepy.

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