KAHULUI — With a sweep, Seabury Hall clinched a couple of championships while denying King Kekaulike one of its own.

The Spartans’ boys and mixed crews secured Maui Interscholastic League titles on Saturday at MIL canoe paddling regatta No. 3, while the Seabury girls kept themselves in the running for the league crown with their first win of the season.

From the Kahului Harbor beach, teammates cheered “Imua, Spartans,” as the girls crew barely edged King Kekaulike in a photo finish during the breezy half-mile race.

“It feels amazing to be able to help out our team and just race as hard as I can,” said sophomore Leiohu Turley, who steered both the Seabury girls and mixed crews to wins. “And it feels good that we just got MIL champs today.”

The Seabury girls crossed the finish line in a time of 4 minutes, 54.93 seconds, less than a second ahead of Na Alii (4:55.73). The Spartans’ win leaves the girls title undecided, for now — King Kekaulike only needs one more victory in the season’s last two regattas to claim the crown.

The Spartans know holding off Na Alii won’t be easy.

“I know we’re going to train so much harder than we have for the next few weeks because these next few regattas are really important for getting a seed for states and I know that we want it, we just have to train harder than we were,” Turley said.

Turley, Gracey Dowd, Rio Imperator, Layne Millen, Maka Carey and Kaesha Purdy started strong and were first into the turn, but came off the flags tied with Na Alii, who took the lead midway down the home stretch.

In a last push, the Spartans came back to win by a stroke.

Both team plans to go back to the drawing board.

“We made some changes and it didn’t pan out,” Na Alii coach Flo Michelier said. “Moving forward these next couple weeks, we’re going to buckle down, train harder, fine-tune the small imperfections and hopefully come back and clinch it.”

Calling it the “race of the week,” Spartans coach Paul Luuwai said that he was proud of how Turley stepped up to fill the steersman seat in the girls and mixed races.

“She had a great day. Just doing all those high-pressure races and performing at that level, and she did, that’s beyond her years,” Luuwai said. “Our backs are against the wall with Kekaulike — we had to beat them today to stay in the running, but we did win four championships today (including JV), so that feels so rewarding.”

Early in the afternoon, what was supposed to be the preliminary heat of the boys varsity division became the finals due to last-minute scratches.

“We thought we were going to have a heat, so we went into it thinking that but it got called off last second, so we just got in a mental zone of like, ‘let’s do this’ and ‘let’s finish it,’ so it kind of just motivated us even more,” Seabury senior Finn McAfee said after steering the boys to their third win of the season to secure the MIL championship.

Seabury’s crew of McAfee, Jake Devane, Caleb Proctor, Sig Konohia, Joshua O’Conner and Austin Lugo finished the half-mile loop in 4:00.75. King Kekaulike (4:08.39) came in second, followed by Kamehameha Maui (4:16.69).

McAfee said that the win feels like “a lot of hard work paid off.”

“We’ve been working really hard and it’s been really challenging with everything going on because all of us love this sport– majority of the crew has been doing this since freshman, sophomore year– so having that and having to face challenges with COVID, we’ve just been trying to keep it together and it really paid off today,” he said. “I think all of us are just really happy to keep pushing and trying to get better.”

To conclude Saturday’s meet, the Spartans’ mixed crew of Devane, Proctor, Carey, Konohia, Imperator and Turley clinched the MIL title with a similarly large win, clocking in at 4:25.97. Na Alii (4:34.29) were second and the Warriors (4:50.59) third.

Luuwai, who was also celebrating his birthday on Saturday, said his team’s main focus over the next few weeks will be on the state meet, set for March 5. That means “staying healthy and staying injury-free.”

“Just watching the kids race is all I wanted for my birthday,” he added. “It’s just so emotional today because I have my daughter (Hi’ilei) coaching with me, my dad’s passing — I didn’t get to hear him say happy birthday for the first time — but you know, it’s really about my kids, watching them perform. I’m so proud of them.”

* Dakota Grossman is at dgrossman@mauinews.com

MIL Regatta No. 3

Saturday’s Results • At Kahului Harbor

Varsity

Girls–1. Seabury Hall (Leiohu Turley, Gracey Dowd, Rio Imperator, Layne Millen, Maka Carey, Kaesha Purdy) 4:54.93, 2. King Kekaulike 4:55.73, 3. Lahainaluna 4:59.21, 4. Kamehameha Maui 5:13.77, 5. Maui High 5:26.25, 6. Molokai 5:36.16.

Boys–1. Seabury Hall (Jake Devane, Caleb Proctor, Sig Konohia, Joshua O’Conner, Austin Lugo, Finn McAfee) 4:00.75, 2. King Kekaulike 4:08.39, 3. Kamehameha Maui 4:16.69, 4. Maui High 4:23.36, 5. Lahainaluna 4:23.75, 6. Molokai 4:27.80.

Mixed–1. Seabury Hall (Jake Devane, Caleb Proctor, Maka Carey, Sig Konohia, Rio Imperator, Leiohu Turley) 4:25.97, 2. King Kekaulike 4:34.29, 3. Kamehameha Maui 4:50.59, 4. Lahainaluna 4:51.25, 5. Baldwin 4:59.98, 6. Kihei Charter 5:15.47.

JV

Girls–1. Seabury Hall (Isabelle Brown, Malia Cosare, Iona Asher, Zella Kofron, Skylar Kuroda, Samantha Cano) 2:18.53, 2. King Kekaulike 2:32.40, 3. Kamehameha Maui 2:34.11.

Boys–1. Kihei Charter (Ethan Peterson, Tanner Brown, Logan Izak, Byron Ellis, Brayden Nunes, Kaimano Edwards) 1:55.40, 2. Seabury Hall 1:59.91, 3. Kamehameha Maui 2:15.29, 4. Maui Prep 2:16.73.

Mixed–1. Seabury Hall (John Ka’ahui, Jake Brocklehurst, Isabelle Brown, Zella Kofron, Skylar Kuroda, Max Moquin) 2:00.08, 2. Kihei Charter 2:01.87, 3. Maui Prep 2:13.22, 4. Kamehameha Maui 2:16.04, 5. King Kekaulike 2:16.54, 6. Baldwin 2:17.67, 7. Lanai 2:36.04.