Hilo rallies past King Kekaulike, opens state baseball tournament with win

Cole Hatayama’s two-out double in the eighth inning turned a tense, back-and-forth opener into the kind of win that can shape a tournament run. Hilo outlasted King Kekaulike 8-6 at Hans L’Orange Park in Waipahu, using a late surge to survive the first round of the Wally Yonamine Foundation Division I State Baseball Championships and keep its season moving on Oahu.

The Vikings, who had lost to King Kekaulike in the preseason, answered when it mattered most. Hatayama’s double with two outs scored Logan Schlueter and Braden Ota to break a tie, and Tyson Santiago followed with a triple to add insurance in the eighth. The timing gave Hilo more than a first-round victory. It delivered a measure of revenge and a pressure-tested result against a team that had already beaten the Vikings once this year.

Hilo coach Baba Lancaster leaned on Hatayama all season, and the late hit fit the role he had assigned him. “He’s our leader,” Lancaster said. He said he had told Hatayama from the start of the season that wherever Hatayama took the team was where it would go. In an 8-6 game that stayed tight into the final innings, Hatayama delivered the swing that matched that confidence.

The box score showed how narrow the margin was. Hilo finished with 9 hits and no errors, while King Kekaulike had 10 hits but committed 7 errors, a difference that proved costly in a bracket game where every out carried weight. Hilo scored in the first, sixth and eighth innings, while King Kekaulike answered in the first, second, fourth and sixth. The game began at 10:45 a.m., lasted 2 hours and 59 minutes, drew 200 fans and was played under overcast skies and 83-degree weather.

Hatayama finished 2-for-4 with two runs and a walk, while Santiago went 4-for-4 with three RBIs. Hilo advanced to face ILH champion Kamehameha the next day, carrying an opener that showed the Vikings can stay composed late, make the cleaner plays, and come through when the tournament starts to squeeze.