RUMORS are rampant in the Kahuku community about the upcoming career decision of former Red Raiders' head coach Doug Semones. Return to prep football
would make sense for SemonesThe colorful 35-year-old New Mexico native, who led Kahuku to four Oahu Interscholastic Association championships between 1989 and 1995 - and who never went through a season without at least a division title - is nearing the end of his two-year leave of absence from the Department of Education.
He has spent the past two seasons as an assistant to Fred vonAppen in the University of Hawaii's football program, and God knows, he's had better times on the prep gridiron.
Semones has until the third week of January to return to the DOE and resume a teaching career, for which his Kahuku principal, Lea Albert, has repeatedly said he is exceptionally talented.
Albert has been besieged by questions about Semones' future with Kahuku. I have heard from more sources than I can recall that he's on his way back. Makes sense. His daily commute from his relatively new home and a very young family to Manoa each day is an arduous grind.
UH's football program is in turmoil, and one does not just discard one's teacher's tenure in this economy.
Everyone who admires Semones - and everyone who loathes him - expects the fire-breathing dragon of Hawaii prep football to be back at the helm of a varsity team by next fall.
SPECIFICALLY, they expect him to be coaching Kahuku - and in the same take-no-prisoners fashion he did for seven uproarious seasons.
But hold on a moment.
His successor, Siuaki Livai, has already been given the job for another season.
After suffering through a horrible first year with the Red Raiders in which the team fell from the elite Red Conference to the middle-of-the-road White Conference, Livai rebounded in a big way.
He guided Kahuku through an unbeaten White Conference season, earning both Coach of the Year honors and a return to the Red Conference with a very promising lineup for 1998. It's a lineup that will include his own son, 6-foot-3, 275-pound offensive lineman Siuaki Livai Jr., a solid student with major college potential.
So, even though Semones might soon be turned loose into the prep football community again, he may not be able to coach.
Nor is there a teaching position available for him at Kahuku right now, according to Albert.
AND, if you ask Semones, which I did last night, you'll hear him tell you - for the record - that he has not made up his mind about his future.
I've annoyed the devil out of him with this question since August but he won't give an answer. Loyalty to vonAppen seems to be his priority right now. But something has to give - and soon. It's only reasonable to expect.
Some of his players would walk through fire for him. And anybody who's ever caught his piercing pregame gaze knows why.
This guy is a keg of dynamite capable of generating incredible passion on the gridiron. He's the rare prep coaching personality who is - all by himself - capable of putting fannies in the seats.
Love him or hate him. You can't ignore him.
He made the OIA believe it had a right to win the Prep Bowl.
He turned out Hawaii's first first-round NFL draft pick (Chris Naeole), and Hawaii's all-time single-season and career rushing leader (Mark Atuaia).
Coaching talents like Semones can't be forgotten while they're still at large.