The Punahou School baseball team's "Drive for Five" certainly was not a smooth ride this season, but it ended in the winner's circle again nonetheless.

Reece Kiriu pitched a three-hitter with eight strikeouts and no walks and the Buffanblu scored all of their runs in the bottom of the second inning last night to beat Saint Louis, 4-0, for their record fifth straight Wally Yonamine Foundation State Championship.

A vocal crowd of 2,712 at Les Murakami Stadium watched Punahou win its eighth consecutive game to finish 16-5-1 in the regular and postseason.

"This year started out rough, and it took a lot of effort to turn it around," said Kiriu, a senior right-hander who allowed only an infield single in the second inning, a single to right in the fourth and a single to center in the sixth. "Right before the (Interscholastic League of Honolulu) tournament, we started focusing more and guys were coming down to practice earlier, to work on their hitting and fielding. That helped."

Last night was quite a turnaround for Kiriu himself, after giving up five runs on four hits and four walks in a two-inning start against Roosevelt in Thursday's quarterfinals. But he was sharp from the beginning against the Crusaders (20-5), who advanced only one runner to second base, in the second inning.

"It was a great performance on the biggest stage, and that just shows what type of player he is," Punahou coach Eric Kadooka said.

The Buffanblu scored four runs in the second inning on four hits, one error and a wild pitch. Zach Kometani got things started with a leadoff single to center field, and courtesy runner Shane Yoshiyama slid safely into second base when Saint Louis tried to get him out on Jeeter Ishida's bunt.

Tyler Young followed with a run-scoring single to left, and Kiriu got aboard on a bunt single. Tyler Hanzawa then hit a grounder to first base to score pinch runner Jeremy Ioane from third, and Young came home on Geoff Kunita's sacrifice fly to right. Courtesy runner Travis Tanaka advanced to third on the throw, and he scored on a wild pitch to make it 4-0.

"We told our guys that (Punahou) would put the pressure on us, and we gotta make the plays," Crusaders coach Duane Fraticelli said. "But I tip my hat to (the Buffanblu). They came to play."

The four-run cushion was more than enough for Kiriu, who ran a three-ball count only three times over the final five innings.

"I just tried to stay on top of my fastball and keep everything down," Kiriu said. "The key was not giving them base runners with walks and beans; that's usually how I would get into trouble."

Kometani, Punahou's catcher, said Kiriu was equally effective with his fastball and his breaking pitches.

"He had good command of his off-speed stuff, and he was pitching so good, (Saint Louis) rarely had good contact," Kometani said.

Punahou endured injuries and internal problems midway through the season that left them in third place in the ILH and clinging to their state tournament hopes.

"We had a team meeting with the players and coaches for a couple hours, and we talked about how we can come back," said Kometani, a fourth-year varsity player. "I have to give credit to Brad Yates, our sports psychologist, because he really helped us out the last couple weeks. We woke up and finally realized what we had to do, and it feels even better now."