Chaminade’s Cook Fit to Be Tied After Extra-Point Try Fails : Prep football: Eagles score with three seconds left but game against Konawaena ends in draw.

Sometimes fairy tales don’t come true, even for a pony-tailed 17-year-old girl with more courage than the Big Island has lava rock.

Amy Cook, Chaminade High’s senior kicker, became the first wahine in anyone’s memory to play high school football in Hawaii when she trotted onto the Konawaena High field Friday night with three seconds to play.

Chaminade had just tied the score against Konawaena, 6-6, on a five-yard scoring pass from Jeff Meyer to Mark Wiltshire. Cook was sent in to kick the extra point.

The snap was decent, the hold good, the kick straight. . . .

But the ball slipped a few tantalizing inches under the crossbar, like a dancer doing the limbo.

So the Ellison Onizuka Memorial game ended in a tie, which made for a great luau Saturday--the teams partied together on equal footing. And by that time, Cook’s errant kick was a mere footnote.

But immediately after the miss, Cook was devastated. Tears streamed down her face as she sat forlornly on the bench.

Within seconds, Cook was consoled by teammates. Aaron Weiss and Andy Krekorian sat on either side of her, arms around her shoulders. Ryan Long, Jason Adai and Matt Sequira were next, each offering a kind word and a hug.

“I should have made it, I should have made it,” Cook repeated between sobs.

Cook had not practiced all week because of a thigh injury. And her teammates pointed to several costly turnovers, disorganization on the sidelines and blown opportunities--any one of which might have led to a different outcome.

It was a team tie, they assured her.

“I’ve never had so much support from the team, the coaches, the fans,” Cook said a few minutes after the game. “If I was them, I’d want to kill me.”

No, Amy Cook, heartbroken but well-loved, will live to kick another day.

“She’ll kick again next week,” Chaminade Coach Rich Lawson said. “We have a lot of faith in her.”

The Eagles were lucky that Cook even had a chance to win the game. Konawaena was running out the clock when Chaminade’s Bill Blair recovered a fumble by quarterback Jason Costello on the Chaminade 47-yard line with 1 minute 36 seconds left.

Meyer hit Jeff Lavarato with consecutive passes of 27 and six yards, and two pass-interference penalties advanced the ball to the five with 16 seconds left.

After two incomplete passes, Meyer rolled right and lofted a pass that Wiltshire wrestled away from a defender in the end zone.

Konawaena (1-0-1), which has won the past 10 Big Island championships, scored with 14 seconds left in the first half on a six-yard pass from Costello to Bobby Ellis. The holder muffed the snap on the extra-point attempt.

“I was impressed with Chaminade’s intensity level,” Konawaena Coach Bob Fitzgerald said. “I thought we’d move the ball on the ground better than we did.”

The game was as even as the final score indicated. Konawaena gained 201 yards in total offense, Chaminade, 198.

Joe Costa, a senior tailback, led Chaminade rushers with 56 yards in 11 carries and Meyer completed nine of 26 passes for 118 yards. Five Eagle drives were stopped by turnovers--three fumbles and two interceptions.

“We showed character at the end, and I’d rather dwell on the positive right now,” Lawson said. “We made a lot of mistakes, but we’ll enjoy our stay and try to get better beginning Tuesday.”