KEAAU – Kamehameha coach Gene Okamura and assistant Lance Thompson watched Bryana-Marie Ebbers mature on the soccer field the past two years, and it’s clear they like the senior’s growth potential.
KEAAU – Kamehameha coach Gene Okamura and assistant Lance Thompson watched Bryana-Marie Ebbers mature on the soccer field the past two years, and it’s clear they like the senior’s growth potential.
So much so, they are not letting her out of their clutches anytime soon.
During a ceremony Monday at Kamehameha celebrating her signing with UH-Hilo, Okamura thanked Ebbers for “forever being all-in for the team.”
That team is changing, but this has all the makings of a smooth transition.
Ebbers took a serious look at a scholarship offer from Western Oregon, but in the end she decided to reprise her role under Thompson, the Vulcans director of soccer, and Okamura, who doubles as a UH-Hilo assistant.
“I was looking at Western Oregon, but coach Lance really helped me more, and I really connected with him,” Ebbers said. “I didn’t think he would want me to play for him at first. But coach Gene and I were talking and that’s when it started.”
Her soccer career started innocently enough when a friend mentioned the sport to her when she was 11.
“I didn’t even know it existed,” Ebbers said.
She played AYSO and joined club teams before blossoming into a prime goal-scoring threat at midfield and striker for the the Warriors, a four-time runner-up to Hawaii Prep in BIIF Division II.
Asked what Thompson and Okamura liked best about her game, the fleet-footed Ebbers gave a quick answer: speed.
“They also like my attitude for the team and that I like to learn new things,” Ebbers said. “I don’t mind staying home because of the nursing program.”
The ceremony – Ebbers didn’t sign her letter of intent because of a technicality and NCAA rules prohibit Thompson and Okamura from commenting until she does so – came just two days after Kamehameha fell just short again against Hawaii Prep, this time 1-0 in the HHSAA Division II championship game.
Ebbers was named to the all-tournament team.
“I’m just proud of my teammates,” she said. “It was a hard one to deal with, but we played the best we could play.”
Thompson has made a concerted effort the past two years to keep Big Island talent at home. Freshman Tiani Teanio, a Waiakea graduate, played in 15 matches last season as the youthful Vulcans finished 5-9-3, and freshman Sabrina Scott, another Waiakea graduate, started the first match of the season before suffering a leg injury.
In order to compete at the NCAA Division II level and handle the rigors of the Pacific West Conference, Ebbers’ first order of business likely will be to add more muscle to her sleek frame.
But she knows the drill under Thompson and Okamura, who told her this season that the Warriors could have held their own if they scrimmaged the Vulcans.
“I still have a lot of hard work ahead,” Ebbers said. “A lot of training and running and I’m just mentally preparing for it.”
Wagner spreads her wings
Sitting at an adjacent table to Ebbers was Kamehameha softball player Makena Wagner, who chose the route of faraway places and new faces.
Wagner spurned a scholarship offer from Division I Jackson State for the opportunity to attend Smith College, a Division III women’s liberal arts school in Northampton, Mass.
“I was kind of nervous about it. I didn’t know the weather or how people on the East Coast would react to someone who looks like me,” she said. “I went for a visit and it was beautiful, and all the people were really friendly and welcoming.”
When Wagner was 10, she was beaned in the head and grew to be afraid of the ball, but she calmed her fears while working with coach Eric Kurosawa.
Wagner hit .424 with 16 RBIs for the four-time defending BIIF Division II champion Warriors as a junior and helped solidify their defense at shortstop for the second consecutive season.
She used the website NCSASports.org to get in contact with Pioneers softball coach Kelly O’Connell.
“She said my hitting was phenomenal and she really likes my fielding,” Wagner said.
A good math student who enjoys drawing, she plans to major in environmental engineering.
“I could have gone another route,” Wagner said of turning down financial assistance at other schools. “Smith is a very academically rigours school. They don’t have to give money. People want to go there.”