MAKAWAO — In just its second season as a varsity program, the Haleakala Waldorf High School boys basketball team has shown serious progress.

The Hawks (4-3) have more Maui Interscholastic League Division II wins than losses and have stamped themselves firmly into the No. 3 seed for the league tournament.

The latest win came Friday night at Eddie Tam Gym as the Hawks celebrated senior night for six of the seven players on their roster with a 55-49, come-from-behind win over St. Anthony.

“We fell down a little bit, we were playing super sloppy, but we picked it up a little bit, especially in that second quarter, and were able to cut down that lead,” said senior Patrick Doster, who finished with a team-high 18 points. “So, yeah, happy with how we pulled it all together tonight.”

The Hawks climbed into the lead in the third quarter for the first time in the game.

Connor Fernandez’s follow shot put them ahead 32-31 with 5 minutes, 25 seconds left in the period, and Doster’s two free throws with 1:06 left gave the Hawks a 39-37 lead going into the fourth quarter.

Doster’s fast-break layup off a nice pass from Will Pang pushed the lead to 45-39 with 6:46 remaining and brought a timeout from St. Anthony coach Kim Kasahara.

The Trojans closed within 49-46 on a jumper by Jon Vergel De Dios with 4:35 to play.

A couple minutes later, Vergel De Dios made a 3 to tie the game at 49-49 before Fernandez answered on the other end to give the Hawks a 51-49 lead.

Fernandez scored off a pretty pass from Pang with 25 seconds left to push the lead to 53-49, and Doster scored at the horn to account for the final score.

The Trojans opened the game with 7-0, 10-2 and 15-6 leads before settling for a 15-8 advantage at the end of the first period.

The Hawks closed within 28-26 at halftime behind Doster’s 10-point effort in the second quarter.

The third seed will bring a quarterfinal matchup in the MIL tournament with the sixth seed. Only one spot is available to the state tournament at this level for the MIL.

“Oh, OK, we’re aiming for that No. 1 then, yeah,” Doster said. “Very important, one-game elimination, can’t lose at all every single night. So, yeah, we’ll see where it takes us.”

Hawks coach Kieran Devanney was pleased with his team’s comeback, but was also surprised by the start for the Trojans (1-6).

“That’s the best I’ve seen St. Anthony play all year long,” Devanney said. “They clearly came prepared. We started off very flat and weren’t ready for it. It’s a testament to how well they prepared last week. It proved that they are a very tough-minded team that will do whatever it takes to get a win.”

The Hawks found a way to prevail in the end.

“We started to settle down in the second quarter and every time we managed to execute our offense, things went well for us,” Devanney said. “So hopefully we can continue that trend and learn that it’s not sometimes yes, sometimes no. We must execute every time.”

Vergel De Dios finished with 18 points and Kaimana Baker scored 16 for the Trojans.

Kasahara was encouraged again by the effort of his team that has just one senior in Evan Essner.

“We had a good week of practice, we had most of our guys at practice — they had some senior night stuff that they had to do, so that was kind of tough,” Kasahara said. “We tried to put in a press even though we have six guys, we tried to change it up a little bit, find our big guy (sophomore Calvin Johnson) in the middle. It was a good fight.

“The work that they’ve put in, I commend them for that. Man, playing with six guys and coming to practice, it’s tough, and we’re running them really, really hard.”

* Robert Collias is at rcollias@mauinews.com

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ST. ANTHONY (49)

Evan Essner 0, Kaimana Baker 16, Nate Rabara 7, Calvin Johnson 8, Jon Vergel De Dios 18, Christian Robson 0.

HALEAKALA WALDORF (53)

Patrick Doster 18, Will Pang 8, La’a Akeo 5, Aidan Goldberg 10, Connor Fernandez 14, Adrian Wertheim 0.

St. Anthony 15 13 9 12–49

Haleakala Waldorf 8 18 13 16–55

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MIL STANDINGS

DIVISION I

W L Pct. GB

x-Lahainaluna 10 0 1.000 —

Maui High 7 3 .667 3

Baldwin 7 4 .636 3 1⁄2

Kamehameha Maui 1 9 .100 9

King Kekaulike 1 10 .091 9 1⁄2

DIVISION II

W L Pct. GB

Seabury Hall 7 0 1.000 —

Lanai 6 1 .857 1

Haleakala Waldorf 4 3 .571 3

Molokai 2 5 .286 5

Hana 1 6 .143 6

St. Anthony 1 6 .143 6

x-clinched regular-season championship

Friday’s Results

Baldwin 46, King Kekaulike 44

Haleakala Waldorf 55, St. Anthony 49

Molokai 64, Hana 37

Seabury Hall 62, Lanai 58

Today’s Games

Seabury Hall at Lanai, 10 a.m.

Molokai at Hana, noon

Haleakala Waldorf vs. St. Anthony at War Memorial Gym, 7 p.m.