RICHARD WALKER / RWALKER@STARBULLETIN.COM
Mililani's Jon Santos (right) and Radford's James Harron battled for a rebound last night.
Fifth-ranked Mililani
drops No. 10 Radford
Radford got the wrong kind of greeting to the Star-Bulletin's top-10 high school basketball poll last night.
The Rams, who entered the poll at No. 10 yesterday, couldn't hold a third-quarter lead and succumbed to No. 5 Mililani 57-52 in an Oahu Interscholastic Association West game at the Radford gym.
The Trojans (6-0) trailed 33-29 midway through the third quarter, but rode the hot hand of Scott Neumann on a 14-4 run for a 43-37 lead heading into the final eight minutes. Neumann, a junior, had nine of his 11 points in the surge, while Aaron Kanno added a 3-pointer.
"They (the Trojans) hit a lot of shots," Radford coach Kai Enos said. "And it's not like we weren't there, because we were. Even with defense and hands in their face, they were still hitting."
Still, the Rams (4-2), who led for most of the first half, didn't crumble. They scored the first seven points of the final period, including Mike Davis' 3-pointer, for a 44-43 edge with 5:20 left.
But Mililani regained control with a pivotal 9-4 run, capped by Alex Patykula's 10-foot stop-and-pop, followed by his steal and layup for a 52-48 lead with 3:30 left.
Clinging to a 52-50 margin with 1:03 remaining, the Trojans put the ball into Puna Neumann's (Scott's brother) hands. The sure-dribbling, sharp-shooting senior hit 5-for-6 from the line for the victory.
"Send my brother to the line and it's money. That's the way I feel about it," Scott Neumann said. "It was a tight game, but we could have made it easier if we moved the ball better, controlled the boards a little better and hit our open shots (early)."
Puna Neumann made three of Mililani's seven 3-pointers on the way to a game-high 19 points. Radford's Tauran Moore finished with 18 points, but he had a hard time against Mililani's zone in the second half when he scored just six points. Mililani's Jon Santos and Nick Rogers held Moore scoreless in the third quarter.
"It's never easy," said Mililani coach Mike Coito, whose team needed double overtime to beat Leilehua last week. "The West is pretty tough this year, and I feel fortunate to get by Radford on (its) home court. I hate to play them here, because they always give us a good game. We switched to the zone because I thought we could rebound a little better that way. Our press worked better in the second half and Scott did a great job hitting those shots."
Ricardo Shipley scored eight of his 12 points in the first half for Radford, which took leads of 13-10 and 26-25 at the first two breaks. James Herron's six fourth-quarter inside points kept the Rams in the game.
"Sure, we want to compete for the West title, but what we really want to do is maximize our potential," Enos said. "If things fall our way, we can get to the states and I'll take that situation over what happened last year."
A year ago, the Rams won the West with a 10-0 mark, but were eliminated in the first round of the league playoffs and didn't qualify for the states.
Mililani showed once again that it belongs among the state's top-ranked teams.
"We've got good chemistry," Scott Neumann said. "When somebody is hot, we'll get him the ball. It doesn't matter where we're ranked as long as we win when it counts."
At Radford H.S. gym
Mililani (6-0) 10 15 18 14 -- 57 Radford (4-2) 13 13 11 15 -- 52
MILILANI--Puna Neumann 19, Scott Neumann 11, Aaron Kanno 11, Clarence Gray 4, Andrew Tokumi 0, Alex Patykula 8, Jon Santos 4, Nick Rogers 0.
RADFORD--Will Kerins 6, Justin Quinones 4, Ricardo Shipley 12, Jordan Rellin 0, Greg Solomon 3, Tauran Moore 18, Mike Davis 3, James Herron 6.
3-point goals: Mililani 7 (P. Neumann 3, Kanno 3, S. Neumann), Radford 6 (Kerins 2, Moore 2, Shipley, Davis)
Junior varsity -- Mililani 50, Radford 38
