Waipio Little League entered the championship game of the Hawaii state tournament hoping to make a return trip to the West Region tournament. The long ball paved the way.

Waipio slammed five home runs to overpower Kaneohe National Little League, 8-2, in the Hawaii state championship game at Freedom Field on Oahu's leeward coast.

"Seeing these kids swing the bat with the wind and the fence being so close, on our team we have about eight guys (with home run potential)," said Waipio manager Timo Donahue. The outfield fence at Freedom Field sits 205 feet from home plate.

Waipio flexed its muscles from the game's first inning. Pitcher Khade Paris struck out the side in the top of the frame, then slammed the first pitch he saw in the bottom of the inning well beyond the right center field fence to score Christian Donahue and give Waipio a 2-0 lead.

Kaneohe National scratched for runs in the second and third innings to tie the game, then Waipio went in front for good on Westin Fabro's solo shot to right center field in the bottom of the third. Pinch hitter Ulumaro Farm added another solo blast in the fourth, and Waipio sealed the win with a four run rally in the fifth.

Fabro and Iolana Akau connected on back-to-back home runs with one out in the fifth, and Jarvis Castro-Lonzaga added a two-run double later in the inning.

Kaneohe's runs came on Micah Camera's RBI groundout in the second, and on a first-and-third stolen base by Kamana Pimentel the next inning.

Waipio had ten hits in the game, while Paris, who struck out eleven, allowed four hits over the first 5-1/3 innings before reaching his pitch count limit.

"No doubt, he was the best pitcher our team faced this year," said Kaneohe National manager Jeff Akamine of Paris' performance.

Waipio's power surge was a far cry from its output the previous game, when the District 7 winners scratched for just three singles, but still rallied past Kaneohe National in the winner's bracket final, 5-4.

Waipio took a 3-1 lead in the third inning of the teams' first meeting, then scored twice in the sixth after Kaneohe National tied the game.

"The kids just found ways to win it and then some," said Timo Donahue after his team held on for the victory. "This really was a total team effort."

A string of Kaneohe National errors helped to spark Waipio's third inning rally. Keelan Obezoda's single up the middle drove in Tanner Tokunaga with the inning's first run, and Obezoda later came around to score following a pair of throwing errors. Christian Donahue also reached and scored following another Kaneohe error.

Kanehoe tied the game in the fifth on Danny Kong's two-out, bases loaded single down the right field line, but Donahue's leadoff walk helped to spark a two-run rally in the top of the sixth.

Kaneohe, which collected eleven hits and had baserunners in every inning, scored once and loaded the bases with one out in the bottom of the sixth inning, but Obedoza struck out the game's final two batters to seal the win.

"This is great," said Timo Donahue after his team held on for the win. "But there are still a lot of really good teams left in this tournament."

Three teams remained in the hunt for the second championship game berth at that point, and Kaneohe National earned a rematch by rallying past Kaimuki Little League, 5-4, in the elimination bracket final. Reid Kimura's three-run homer in the second inning helped Kaimuki to carry a 4-1 lead into the bottom of the sixth inning, but Kaneohe scored four times in the final frame to scratch out the win.

Each of Kanoehe's sixth inning runs scored on a bases-loaded walk, with two-out walks to Eric Akamine and Kalei Davis pushing across the tying and winning runs.

"I told them we have to take one (strike)," said Jeff Akimine of his team's patience in the final inning. "Make sure we don't lose the bame by swinging at bad pitches. So we were taking one and that paid off at the very end."

"Whenever you jump to a lead early in this type of format, you can always get a lot of momentum," said Kaimuki manager Gerald Oda. "Hopefully that's enough to carry you through the end of the game.

"We just ran out of gas in the last inning," he added.

Waipio reached the semifinal round of the West Region tournament for the second consecutive year, where the Hawaiian champions were eliminated following an 8-1 loss to eventual Little League World Series qualifier Chandler National (Arizona) Little League.