The University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo‘s 2019–20 senior class will not get a proper send off because of COVID-19. While some were able to have a Senior Day, all of them will miss their Athletic Senior Sash and Graduation ceremony.
UH Hilo will highlight its seniors, two at a time, to give the seniors their special recognition Instead of the Pepsi Athletes of the Week, it’s now Pepsi Seniors of the Week.
This week, UH Hilo salutes two more softball players who are graduating in 2020—Kristen Ishii and Shiori Ubukata.
Ishii was looking forward to getting back on the field in 2020 after taking a break from softball in 2018 and 2019 to concentrate on her nursing studies. However, she hadn’t had a chance to practice enough when the season came to an abrupt end due to COVID-19. Back in 2017, Ishii started all 48 games for the Vulcans in left field, hitting .313 with 34 runs scored. She had nine doubles and a pair of home runs as one of the top freshmen in the PacWest. Ishii will graduate with her nursing degree and may return as a graduate student to compete for the Vulcans in 2021.
After transferring from Genesee Community College in New York, Ubukata, a Tokyo, Japan native, redshirted at UH Hilo in 2019. She was looking forward to contributing to the Vulcan program, but injuries had a part in derailing her start. Nonetheless, her teammates voted her as their “Most Pono Vulcan” in 2019. Shiori, who also played baseball in high school, will graduate in the fall with a degree in sociology.
Congrats to Ishii and Ubukata!
