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Team Plays On, Despite Tragedy
Julia Norton-Dennis and Sabrina Hall
Most football games are played with gusto for the win, and for the team.
This game was different.
The day after a big game with Kahuku, some Castle High School Knights are discussing the loss.
Not the loss on the field. The loss in their hearts.
“We did it for Pat,” said Jesse Humalon, Castle Knight cornerback. “He was proud just to see us out there.”
The Knights played their hearts out in Kahuku, even though they were missing a key player.
Lineman and kicker Patrick Kapahu was critically injured in a skate boarding accident.
His teammates learned he’d died, just hours before the game.
Castle Knights Linebacker Corey Paredes has known Kapahu since first grade. He was shocked by the news.
“I didn’t believe it at first, cause Pat, he always seemed to be like the invincible guy,” Paredes said.
The team had to decide whether to go on and play, or stay off the field out of respect for their friend.
They chose to play — in honor of Kapahu.
Castle Knights Coach Nelson Maeda says the team had a meeting in the afternoon and the decision was made.
“Very difficult, you know, I give these 16, 17-year-olds a lot of credit for enduring something that even adults have a great difficulty doing,” Maeda said.
“That was the hardest game I ever played,” said Castle Knights Cornerback Jesse Humalon. “The focus, the concentration, none of it was there.”
Kapahu wasn’t physically on the field last night, but his teammates felt his presence.
“Last night, when Scott went to kick the field goal, Pat was with him, cause that was — that was the farthest I’ve ever seen Scott kick the ball,” Humalon said.
The Knights fell to the Raiders, and the loss on the field will be made up in games to come.
But the loss of a friend, brother, son and team player, will forever linger.
“He was a good friend,” Estioko says. “Anytime you needed him, he was there.”
“He was everything.”
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