Rainbow Connection is a special series highlighting former MIL student-athletes who are now competing for the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Stories will run periodically this spring in The Maui News.

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With a season to go in her remarkable career on the diamond, Nawai Kaupe has made a clear impact on all those around her.

Kaupe will finish her junior season for the University of Hawaii softball team this week with a three-game series beginning today at Rainbow Wahine Softball Stadium against UC Davis.

After playing on two Women’s College World Series teams for Washington in her first two seasons, the Maui High School graduate transferred to UH prior to the pandemic-shortened 2020 season.

Now, she can’t imagine playing anywhere else.

“Oh, what can I say? There’s not much words that can express my feelings about how I feel about wearing ‘Hawaii’ on my chest,” Kaupe said Wednesday. “Definitely made a huge transition of moving back home. It was definitely an honor and opportunity.”

Hawaii head coach Bob Coolen is happy to have Kaupe, who leads the 11-17 Wahine in home runs (five), RBIs (20) and runs (21).

“I recruited her as a senior in high school and she had committed to us, but then Washington came a knocking at her door and that was an opportunity she couldn’t pass up,” Coolen said. “We had offered her a scholarship out of high school and she decided to go to Washington — it happens. Once the Power Five schools jump in, it’s a whole different world.

“So, when we lost her we knew we lost a really good player, someone that had a lot of baseball savvy skills, which translates so well into softball. I just want to say that my baseball players from over here have become some of my better better softball players at the university.”

Kaupe was one of the best players on a Little League Majors Division All-Star team that won the Hawaii state title when she was 12.

“Nawai had the skillset, the mentality, everything that you want in a ballplayer to be the focal-point leader of your team,” Coolen said. “So when she contacted me after two years at Washington and said she was coming home, it just made my whole roster elevated in the sense of we had a former Power Five player coming into our program from U-Dub, coming home to play in front of her home state.

“Fortunately she’s staying with me for one more year.”

Rainbow Wahine opponents have taken notice at just how good Kaupe is, according to Coolen.

“She has added numerous accolades from coaches in the Big West (Conference) this year, saying she’s one of the better shortstops,” Coolen said. “Her throwing from different angles, her ability to field, her knowledge of the game, her running ability, her hitting prowess, everything about her is who you want to have on the field.”

Kaupe is thankful to the coach she once had to tell she wasn’t joining his program.

“I thank Coach Bob every single day for allowing me to play back at home,” she said.

Haloa Dudoit, a former Baldwin High School schoolmate of Kaupe before she transferred to Maui High, is finishing his career this week for Concordia Irvine baseball.

Dudoit is currently a graduate student in coaching and athletic administration who remembers Kaupe as one of the best baseball players he played against as a youth. He used those memories in a recent women in sport class he took.

“I remember playing with Nawai Kaupe,” Dudoit said Monday. “I used her in some of my discussion boards just talking about how when I was young I was playing against her and she was just like another teammate of ours or another competitor.

“She hung with us and it’s cool to see that she gets those opportunities because of the people that came before us.”

While it won’t mean a postseason berth, the season-ending series with UC Davis has significance.

Davis is 11-10 in league play — good for third place — while UH, UC San Diego and UC Santa Barbara are all tied for fourth at 10-11. Hawaii can finish anywhere from third to sixth in league play depending on this week’s results — and UH did not have the chance to play fall ball because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Conference speaking, we have to win this series in order to be third,” Kaupe said. “So, that’s important for us and that’s our goal heading into this week.”

Another former Maui High standout, sophomore Cira Bartolotti, is also on the UH roster. Bartolotti, who attended Kapolei for her last two years of high school, has appeared in seven games as an outfielder and hit a home run against Long Beach State in her only at-bat this season.

Coolen would like to see Bartolotti regain the pitching prowess that made her a Maui Interscholastic League Division I Player of the Year as a freshman. Kaupe said she has been a key member of the team this year.

“I’m actually very proud of her this year,” Kaupe said. “She’s always engaged, regardless if she’s benched or not. That’s what we need, is someone to always be in tune with the game even if they’re on the bench. In tune with the game and cheering for our team. She knows her role and that’s what I love about her.”

Kaupe is ready to come back for her senior season, her fifth year allowed due to the pandemic-shortened schedule in 2020.

She is set to finish her sociology bachelor’s degree in the fall and she knows she will automatically be seen as a team leader in 2022.

“Definitely my role as a leader, I’m more of an action, more visible as a leader,” she said. “I don’t really talk — I have less words than I do when I’m actually performing it.

“So I feel like my role would be more so doing it than just talking it, but at the same time I feel like next year I will have to open my mouth more.”

* Robert Collias is at rcollias@mauinews.com.