Wednesday, December 5, 2001
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Yamaguchi WHEN Kehau Yamaguchi starts smiling on the softball mound, it usually portends bad things for opposing hitters.
hopes to finesse
UHS to states
The ace pitcher will carry the
load for the Junior 'BowsBy Jason Kaneshiro
jkaneshiro@starbulletin.comWhen confronted with situations that would have most pitchers sweating through their jerseys, the University High senior simply smiles and eases herself out of the jam.
"I'll ask her, 'Why were you smiling in the seventh inning with the bases loaded?' " Yamaguchi's father, Ken, said. "And she told us that's the way she calms herself down."
The Junior 'Bows will need Yamaguchi to keep her cool this season as they begin their run for the program's first state tournament berth in seven years.
UHS opens its Interscholastic League of Honolulu schedule today by taking on defending league champion Iolani at Ala Wai Field. Over her career, Yamaguchi has saved some of her best games for the league's top teams.
"Sometimes the batters get frustrated because it's like no matter what happens they can't rattle her," said UHS sophomore Iwa Yamaguchi, Kehau's younger sister and her catcher last season.
The Junior 'Bows picked up some momentum heading into the regular season by winning their annual Thanksgiving Classic two weeks ago.
Although the tournament doesn't have an official most valuable player award, Yamaguchi would almost certainly have earned the accolade. The right-hander pitched 21 1/3 innings over the three-day tournament, won three games and picked up a save.
She yielded just eight hits and two earned runs, both coming in the Junior 'Bows' 7-3 win over Campbell in the tournament championship game. She struck out a tournament-record 38 batters, including 16 in a no-hitter against Nanakuli.
She had a perfect game through six innings against the Golden Hawks, until an error in the seventh led to Nanakuli's first baserunner. Ironically, it was a bobble by Iwa, who was playing third base, that cost her the perfect game.
But Yamaguchi's easy-going attitude prevented her from giving her younger sister a hard time about it.
"I didn't really notice I even had a perfect game until people started going up to Iwa after that inning," Yamaguchi said. "But it's all right. She's usually my catcher, and I'm really comfortable with her being my catcher. But she strained her quad so third base was a new position for her."
Yamaguchi doesn't beat batters by throwing the ball by them. Instead, she relies on location and deception to get hitters out.
"She's more of a finesse pitcher," UHS coach Willard Gilbert said. "She doesn't have that great speed. But she knows how to hit her spots and move the ball to get batters out."
She throws a rise-ball, screwball, drop and change-up, and her ability to mix pitches and change speeds makes her deliveries look faster than they actually are.
"Her ball moves but it's still quick," Iwa said. "Not all pitchers can do both."
Yamaguchi developed her skills growing up in a household that revolves around softball.
Ken is an assistant coach at Chaminade and Kehau's older sisters, twins Aloha and Kea, are on college rosters. Aloha, who preceded her younger siblings at UHS, is slated to start at second base for the University of Pacific. Kea, a Castle graduate, is a catcher for the University of Hawaii.
"Softball has been really good to us," Ken Yamaguchi said. "With four girls, and two going to college at the same time, it would have been hard; softball has been a vehicle for them to get to college."
The Yamaguchis spent most of their childhood weekends at Kahaluu Elementary School working on their skills with their father, and Kehau's willingness to put in a little extra effort has helped her refine her pitching repertoire.
"A lot of her success was built because she works hard in the back yard," Ken said. "She waits for me to come home and has her glove ready and the pitching mound set up and she wants to work."
Yamaguchi credits her older sisters for instilling her work ethic.
"They've taught me how competitive I have to be and how I have to keep pushing and learn from every coach that I have," she said.
In addition to her family workouts, Yamaguchi added to her softball experience by playing in two mainland tournaments last summer. She played with the Na Wahine team in a tournament in Colorado and went to the Babe Ruth World Series with the Pearl City Pearls.
The Pearls won a regional tournament in California to advance to the 16-and-under World Series in Abbeville, La., where they lost to Tri County, Texas in the finals.
And Yamaguchi, along with fellow seniors Briana Tsukamoto, Tara Hiramatsu and Nicole Ortigero, would love nothing more than to finish their high school careers in the state tournament in January.
"We're going to be on her back to get us there," Gilbert said. "But I told the team they need to do their jobs, it can't just be her."
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