Boise State’s Kaniho compelled by his Mana. ‘We stand on the shoulders of giants.’
A television camera zoomed in tight on Alabama quarterback Tua Tagovailoa as he scraped himself off the turf in Levi’s Stadium after losing a second-quarter fumble, which the Crimson Tide never recovered from in January’s College Football Playoff championship game.
As soon as former Kahuku High football coach Vae Tata saw Tagovailoa’s eyes, he knew the game was over. He had seen that look before, and as Clemson lined up to begin its drive, Tata heard from his former player who caused it — Boise State nickel Kekaula Kaniho.
“He texted me right after and said: ‘Coach, it’s over. I’ve seen that look before,’ ” said Tata, who was at a coach’s clinic in San Antonio and gathered with colleagues to watch Clemson’s 44-16 victory.
Four years prior in the Division-I Hawaii state championship game, St. Louis School led Kahuku 7-0 after scoring on an early blocked punt. Tagovailoa was moving the offense down the field again when he decided to scramble. Kaniho left the receiver he was covering on the far side of the field and delivered a blow, which dislodged the ball and led to Kahuku’s first points in a 39-14 victory.
“The moment Kekaula hit him, I could see his eyes from the sideline and I knew we had him rattled,” Tata said. “That 2015 hit on Tua, I think that was just the start of Kekaula’s career.”
At 5-foot-10 and 183 pounds, Kaniho is far from the heftiest member of the Boise State defense and his role varies from covering slot receivers to setting the edge against the run. But he plays with an intensity that has him at No. 2 in the Mountain West Conference with seven tackles for a loss, and he trails only teammate Curtis Weaver, who has 10.
Tata attributed Kaniho’s downhill mentality to his “Mana.”
“It’s the Polynesian spirit that we get from our ancestors and those who have gone before us. We stand on the shoulders of giants,” Tata said. “People talk about the ‘Mana,’ and Kekaula has it. He has no fear and he’s going to give you everything he’s got.”
Kaniho finding motivation in something bigger than himself makes perfect sense to Boise State football coach Bryan Harsin, who called him one of the most driven players he has coached.
“You don’t have very many guys like that, that you get to coach that are just compelled. He’s absolutely compelled,” Harsin said. “We’ve got him a little bit bigger, a little bit faster and a little bit stronger, but here’s a guy that just needs a good plan and he’s going to go work and get it done.”
Through five games this season, Kaniho already has set career highs in tackles for loss (seven) and sacks (two).
With Hawaii in town on Saturday (8:15 p.m., ESPN2), he’ll go in search of a few more stops behind the line of scrimmage against the upwards of 20 players he knows on the Rainbow Warriors’ roster.
“It’s just going to be fun for me to go against a lot of guys I played with in high school,” Kaniho said. “A lot of people back home are going to be rooting for Hawaii but at the same time rooting for me personally.”
Kaniho and former teammate Ra Elkington decided to go the private school route early in their high school careers, but they both transferred back to Kahuku in 2015. On Saturday, they’ll reunite on the blue turf of Albertson Stadium.
“Still to this day, we send each other texts and stuff,” Kaniho said. “We have a really good relationship.”
Kaniho is expecting to have plenty of family members on hand. His parents won’t be at the game because it’s also his younger brother, Koanohi’s, senior night at Kahuku, but his grandmother flew into Boise on Thursday morning and he has a host of aunts, uncles and cousins heading north.
“It’s a big deal for our little community,” Kaniho’s father, Jarrett, said. “No matter where our boys go, they know they have a community behind them. I’ve talked to so many people over the last couple days who can’t wait to run into Kekaula up there.”
Kaniho followed in his father’s footsteps in high school and beyond. Jarrett Kaniho was also an undersized defensive back and a wide receiver at Kahuku, and he never shied away from a collision.
“They both played with a chip on their shoulder,” said current Kahuku football coach Sterling Carvalho, who was the JV coach and a varsity assistant in 2015-16. “Kekaula plays bigger than his size. That’s an attribute to his dad, his family and more or less his heart. Their hearts are bigger than anybody else, and when they stepped on the field, they played to be the best DB we ever had.”
In 2016, Kaniho looked like the best defensive back in Kahuku history and one of the best in the nation. He earned Honolulu Star-Advertiser Defensive Player of the Year honors after he finished the season with six interceptions, five of which he returned for touchdowns, which is tied for No. 2 all-time in a single season, according to the National Federation of State High School Associations.
It was that playmaking ability that caught the eye of Boise State safeties/nickels coach Gabe Franklin.
“You can’t teach playmakers,” Franklin said. “They’ve got it or they don’t. Watching him, I didn’t care how big he was. He was a playmaker, and he had close to a 4.0 GPA, so I knew we could put a lot on him mentally and still have him perform at this level, and that’s what he’s doing now.”
That playmaking ability has translated to his college career.
As a true freshman, Kaniho scored two defensive touchdowns. The first came on a 34-yard fumble recovery, and the second on a 53-yard pick-six in the Las Vegas Bowl. Last fall, he led the team with three interceptions and recovered a fumbled punt by one of his teammates and returned it 74 yards for a score. He only has one interception this season, but he returned it 50 yards and set up a late scoring drive in a win over Air Force.
“The explosion he can create suddenly is what you want on defense. He has the ability to make plays, but also create takeaways,” Boise State defensive coordinator Jeff Schmedding said. “The more you can do, the more you get to do. He proves consistently that he knows what he’s doing, and he does it really well.”
The effects of those big plays aren’t just felt on the field. They reverberate through the sideline and even the nosebleed seats.
“That’s huge momentum,” Boise State safety Kekoa Nawahine said. “Anytime somebody is scoring, somebody is making a play, an interception, a forced fumble, whatever it is, that’s momentum gained for a whole team, not just the defense. So when he’s able to go out there and do his thing, that’s a big boost for the whole team.”
Hawaii recruited Kaniho out of high school, but he always wanted to leave the island and he followed his father’s lead once again in doing so. Jarrett Kaniho began his college football career at Iowa Wesleyan and also played at Laney College in Oakland, so he understood the value of getting away from home.
“The biggest thing is being able to grow up and mature quickly,” he said. “It’s just the mentality and mindset of life. It’s everything outside of football and being able to be independent.”
Another Kaniho is on his way to Boise State after Koanohi’s verbal commitment in August. In three games in 2018, he intercepted two passes, including one he returned for a touchdown, before a knee injury cost him the rest of his junior season.
After having a front-row seat for Koanohi’s sophomore season, which included Honolulu Star-Advertiser All-State honors as a cornerback and him hauling in a long touchdown pass to briefly put Kahuku up on St. Louis in the 2017 state championship game, Carvalho said his resemblance to his older brother was unmistakable.
“They’re just so smart on the field, and they pick up things so fast. They can practice all week as a defensive back, but if we need them as a receiver, we just tell them a couple times what they need to do and they just pick it up,” Carvalho said. “Their natural athletic ability and football IQ allow them to play so fast.”
According to scoringlive.com, Koanohi has three interceptions and one pick-six for Kahuku this season, so Boise State now has a pipeline of athletic and intelligent Kaniho brothers.
“I think the fit at Boise is perfect,” Jarrett Kaniho said. “Whatever they’re doing, it’s working, and lot of the values we have at home are similar to the program up there.”
HAWAII AT NO. 14 BOISE STATE
When: 8:15 p.m. Saturday
Where: Albertsons Stadium (36,387, FieldTurf)
TV: ESPN2 (Roy Philpott, Kelly Stouffer, Lauren Sisler)
Radio: KBOI 670 AM/KTIK 93.1 FM (Bob Behler, Pete Cavender)
Records: Boise State 5-0 overall, 2-0 Mountain West; Hawaii is 4-1, 1-0
Series: Boise State leads 12-3 (last meeting: Boise State won 52-16 on Nov. 12, 2016, at Hawaii)
Vegas line: Boise State by 13
Weather: 49 degrees, clear, light wind at kickoff
