Sidelines
Smiling Spiker wins
fourth state crownTHE smile said so many things. Relief. Joy. Triumph. Everything.
How do you sum up a moment like this? A career. A destiny. All those early mornings and late nights and extra work all wrapped into one crowning achievement, one exultant smile. One moment in the sun.
"Right now, it's everything," Jonathan Spiker said.
He'd won his fourth state wrestling championship.
His Saint Louis Crusaders were second to Iolani, last night, relinquishing the crown. But nothing could dampen the mood. This was history, the second Hawaii boy ever to do the undoable. This was Spiker, the feel-good All-American guy. The super student headed for Harvard.
The toughest nice guy you'll ever meet.
He shows you his heart in everything he does.
"He enjoys being out there," his coach, Todd Los Banos, put it.
But this was different, these past few weeks. History hung over him. He thought about it when he went to sleep. In the morning when he woke up. He'd get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, and it was his fourth straight state title that he would see.
"I dream about this," he said.
The tension was building.
There were nerves. There are always nerves. "You're always nervous and anxious and jumpy," he said. But this time it was worse.
This was it.
Others had planned it for longer than he had. Since he started. Before he'd even won his first.
"They kept saying it," Spiker said.
You could see it in him.
"As hard as he's worked," Los Banos said, "all that he's trained and does. He made it happen himself."
Was Los Banos nervous?
"No," he said. He knew. With Spiker, he always knew.
Everyone did.
There was Ray-Ian Transfiguracion, the Big Island champ. He'd chosen his weight class, 152, solely for the chance to meet Spiker at last.
"I was waiting for this for three years now," the state runner-up said.
He couldn't wait. You just never know. "Things happen," he said.
But they didn't, not with Spiker. They never do. In four years, they never have. Transfiguracion got almost as many accolades in the locker room as the champion did, after the 17-7 final. Transfiguracion, of Konawaena, said he hadn't been taken down all season. Spiker did it to him eight times.
And this was considered a tough match.
"All I could do, Transfiguracion said, "was just wrestle."
And in the end, he could smile, too.
But at last Spiker could relax. He could exhale, with a look that said everything. He felt everything. He'd been feeling it for weeks. He'd dreamt about it over and over.
Now it had happened. Now it was real.
Saint Louis was no longer champion. But nothing could diminish this.
He'd really done it. Harvard awaits.
Transfiguracion said it best. "It's a smart man's sport."
Kalani Simpson can be reached at ksimpson@starbulletin.com