Pacific Athletes of the Week: Jan. 26, 2012
Preston Harris
Kadena basketball
Last week - Named to the All-Tournament team for helping the Panthers win four of their five games and capture the title in the Okinawa-American Shootout. It was Kadena’s first championship in the tournament since 2008 after losing in the finals the last three years.
Harris, a sophomore forward, scored 22 points and pulled down 14 rebounds in the championship game, a see-saw 73-67 victory over 2010-11 island champion Konan in which the game was tied 10 times and the lead changed hands seven times. The Panthers are 11-11 this season.
Robert Bliss, the Panthers’ assistant coach the past two seasons, says Kadena brought Harris up from the junior varsity last year and he and head coach Ray Broughton were “impressed with his inside play,” making the Far East tournament traveling team.
“Lately, his play has been fantastic, rebounding and scoring,” Bliss said, adding that the recent spurt began with the Martin Luther King Invitational against adults, “and he had a great Shootout.”
Eisiah Lawson
Kadena basketball
Last week - Earned All-Tournament honors and, alongside teammate Deja Caldwell, made the difference in the middle as the Panthers (14-7 on the season) won all four games they played in capturing the first Okinawa-American Shootout tournament title in school history in the six years the tournament’s been held.
Lawson, a junior, scored 26 points and grabbed 16 rebounds as the Panthers raced to a 31-18 halftime lead, then fought off a second-half charge by Naha Shogyo for a 55-54 victory. Lawson’s rebound layup with 13 seconds left provided the final margin.
Coach Willie Ware said Lawson and Caldwell, who had 16 points and 12 rebounds, provide an inside presence the Panthers have not had in the past several years.
“She forces opponents to take bad shots, she alters shots, she provides a rebounding presence, something we’ve been missing, a true ‘big’ player inside,” Ware said. “Offensively, she is very fundamentally sound.”
