Earned 2 Purple Hearts
and raised Wahine coach

Decades before the term "student-athlete" became popular, Kobe "Pops" Shoji was proof that academics and athletics made a good team.

Both required hard work that, if applied correctly, would translate into success. Shoji, a two-sport athlete in college, went on to earn his doctorate and became a world-renowned expert in sugar cane.

Dave Shoji won't miss tournament Hawaii women's volleyball coach Dave Shoji will be with the Rainbow Wahine when the team leaves Thursday for the Western Athletic Conference tournament in Reno, Nev. Shoji said he would return in time for his father's funeral services next Monday. The WAC tournament begins Friday, with the championship scheduled for Sunday. Shoji said he did not know if he would fly back to the mainland after the funeral for the team's two matches at Utah State on Nov. 23 and Utah on Nov. 24.

Sandwiched between those two accomplishments was his World War II Army service, where, as a member of the famed "Go For Broke" 442nd Regimental Combat Unit, Shoji was awarded two Purple Hearts.

The father of Hawaii women's volleyball coach Dave Shoji died Saturday night in Queen's Medical Center. He was 84.

Kobe Shoji had been suffering from lung cancer and had been hospitalized for the past three weeks with complications from pneumonia.

Dave Shoji said he didn't know his father had died until after the Rainbow Wahine rallied to defeat Nevada. He left the arena immediately after the match to be with his family.

Kobe Shoji was born in Upland, Calif., on July 27, 1920. He was a single-wing tailback and a long jumper for Pomona (Calif.) College.

When World War II was declared, he and his family were interned at the Poston, Ariz., relocation camp. There, he met his future wife, the former Chizuko "Chiz" Fujiwara.

Shoji enlisted in the Army and was assigned to the all-Japanese-American unit that would become the most decorated in World War II. Upon returning from basic training, he and Fujiwara were married in the camp in 1943 and he was then sent to Europe.

After the war, he returned to Pomona College to finish his undergraduate degree and went on to earn a Ph.D at UCLA.

Shoji moved his young family to Hawaii in 1950 and joined C. Brewer, rising to the rank of vice president. He spent four years in Iran and Puerto Rico, helping those areas develop a sugar-cane industry.

Upon returning to Hawaii, he joined Alexander & Baldwin as a vice president and traveled the world as an authority on sugar cane.

Shoji is survived by wife Chizuko; sons Dave and Kelvin of Honolulu, and Tom of Pueblo, Colo.; and six grandchildren.

Services are next Monday at Nuuanu Memorial Park at 6 p.m., with visitation from 4:30 to 6 p.m.