WHEN the Molokai High School boys' team arrived here last Thursday about a half hour late for its first match in the Nissan/Hawaii High School Athletic Association Volleyball Tournament at McKinley High, I got an eerie sensation. Athletes in state tourneys
deserve betterI cursed the lousy weather that drenched me as I ran from my car to the gym door, and I couldn't help thinking about an ill-fated flight carrying volleyball players from that same island seven years ago.
This team, which arrived safely on its economy flight, had checked in at the airport in Molokai at about 9 a.m. The scheduled 10:30 a.m. flight to Oahu was cancelled, and so was the 1:20 p.m. flight.
Of course they hung in there for more than seven hours and caught the only flight they could. As their coach, Kathleen Keala, said, "Hey, it's the states, so you tough it out. It's a privilege just to go."
Public high school coaches who often have to dip into their own pockets to pay for their players' meals don't find a statement like that surprising.
THE Farmers got to the Tigers' facility at 6 p.m. They were supposed to have played Pearl City at 5:30 p.m. Tournament officials rescheduled their matches for later that evening.
"When we got on the court, the kids just couldn't put their minds in the game and get that intense," said Keala, who slept in the Moanalua High School gym that night with her 6-month-old baby and about 28 other members of the Molokai entourage.
The Molokai girls' volleyball team and some other neighbor island teams that are reliant on public funds and what their leagues can scrape up will endure a similar hardship this week for the second phase of the Nissan/HHSAA tournament .
It's encouraging to hear that new Hawaii High School Athletic Association executive director Dwight Toyama is committed to securing sponsorships that can pay for team travel, hotel accommodations and decent meals.
But, first, Toyama has to find businessmen conscientious enough to wonder why these kids have to travel like Rwandan refugees.
Hawaiian Airlines came up with a lot of seats last summer to help keep alive a second-rate local "pro" soccer team that attracted few fans.
WHY can't that airline, or one of its competitors, Aloha or Mahalo, offer to ferry the state tournament kids interisland?
I promise you that there's a lot more goodwill to be gained from taking care of local teen-age athletes than there is for taking care of here-today-gone-tomorrow soccer gypsies from parts unknown.
And how about the many hotels we have in this state? Why can't they offer to help sponsor some of the tournaments and give the kids beds.
It would only be for a few nights and even sleeping four to a room is better than being on a floor.
Look, this is how it works: the dog and cat sleep on the floor, not the kids. Especially not kids who've just given their all to qualify for the state's most prestigious prep competition.
And, let's not forget the restaurants.
I don't mean John Dominis or Hy's Steak House. I mean any place that's better than the fast-food emporiums.
I cringe to see what some of these traveling athletes eat before and after state tournament trips because they don't have enough money for a good meal.
Forgive me, but I keep thinking about the eight members of the Molokai High boys' and girls' volleyball teams who died en route home in that 1989 plane crash.
Those kids spent their last night alive on a locker room floor.