Revisiting Dillon Gabriel’s (former) all-time passing record and the missing box score

Author’s note: A previous version of this post incorrectly stated that Hawaii Prep World did not have statistics from the Mililani Trojans’ non-league game vs. Clayton Valley on Sept. 1, 2017.

Oregon Ducks quarterback and Heisman candidate Dillon Gabriel moved ahead of former Hawai’i quarterback Timmy Chang for No. 2 in NCAA career passing yards last weekend in a win over Illinois.

But before Gabriel was moving up the collegiate all-time passing leaderboard, the Mililani alumnus was passing up Tua Tagovailoa for the all-time Hawai’i high school passing record in 2018. Per Hawaii Prep World, Gabriel finished with 9,848 passing yards during his prep career in Central Oahu.

Now there is some debate among local media on whether or not Campbell QB Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele has already surpassed Gabriel’s record, but that’s not the reason for this article. 

Instead, the purpose of this post is to show that Gabriel’s (former) career passing total in high school is actually higher than what’s reported.

From an article on Bedrock Sports Hawaii by Nick Abramo, a former sports reporter for the Honolulu Star-Advertiser and Hawaii Prep World, Gabriel passed for 472 yards in his freshman year, 2,656 in his sophomore year, 2,973 in his junior year and 3,747 yards in his senior year for a grand total of 9,848.

A 2021 article on Bedrock Sports Hawaii written by Nick Abramo lists Dillon Gabriel’s passing statistics up to that point.

But there is a discrepancy on Hawaii Prep World’s site for Gabriel’s freshman statistics. In its-game-by game stats for 2015, Gabriel passed for 116 yards against Moanalua in a regular season game on Oct. 2, 2015, 140 yards in a playoff game against Na Menehune a few weeks later, 297 in an OIA semifinal game against Waianae and 119 yards in the OIA Division I championship game before a season-ending injury.

Dillon Gabriel’s freshman passing totals in a game-by-game format per Hawaii Prep World.

Those numbers combined equal to 672 however, a much larger sum than the printed 472 yards in the Trojans’ 2015 statistical leaderboard. When you add the updated total from 2015 to Gabriel’s career stats, you get a number that’s over 10,000.

Hawaii Prep World’s statistical leaderboard for passing for the Mililani Trojans in 2015.

But there are other places online that do not have Gabriel’s correct total.

ScoringLive — a media source that provides game coverage, stats, scores, standings and more (and where the author of this article was employed at for nearly a decade) — has Gabriel’s stats from his freshman, sophomore, junior and senior seasons at Mililani and is displayed below in a game-by-game format.

Dillon Gabriel drops back to pass in a home game against Nanakuli during his junior year in 2017. | Michael Lasquero for ScoringLive

Gabriel’s cumulative stats throughout all four years using ScoringLive’s database totals 9,973 yards.

But that total amount is still wrong.

Enter the missing box score.

ScoringLive does not have statistics recorded from Mililani’s non-league game on Sept. 1, 2017 in Concord, Calif., against the Clayton Valley Charter Ugly Eagles (yes that is what they are known as).

Mililani’s stats from that game have been relatively unknown, except for the fact that Gabriel threw one touchdown pass in a 49-30 win.

However, footage of the game in its entirety still exists online so doing stats of the missing game in Gabriel’s career was on the agenda Wednesday night.

Time to bust out the big notepad and take stats manually using paper and pen while keeping a running play-by-play log.

Gabriel did not have to do much through the air against Clayton Valley as he finished with 160 passing yards and a TD by completing 16 of his 27 pass attempts. 

Led by Kilifi Malepeai’s 171 yards and four TDs on 34 carries, the Trojans would score on six of their nine offensive possessions. Current New York Giants linebacker Darius Muasau also got involved in the running attack and ran for 74 yards and a first-half TD on 10 carries.

Mililani stats vs. Clayton Valley on Sept. 1, 2017.

Gabriel did have his moments though. On a third-down play during Mililani’s opening series, Gabriel bought time in the backfield before finding Nayyir Muhammad for a 28-yard strike to extend the possession.

He also completed a 22-yard pass to Mystic-Josiah Sampaga to convert fourth-and-22 to make sure that the Trojans scored on all three of their first-half possessions as they took a 21-8 lead at halftime.

Defense and special teams set up Mililani’s two TDs in the third quarter as a fumble recovery made it a 27-8 game and a long kickoff return to the 2-yard line set up Malepeai’s third rushing TD of the game to make it a 35-16 game heading into the final period of play.

Gabriel’s lone score against Clayton Valley came in the fourth quarter when he threw a 14-yard TD pass that ended up the hands of Raysen Motoyama. The ball was intended for wideout Ryan Chang, but he juggled the ball in the air before Motoyama was able to secure it in the back of the end zone.

With the missing stats accounted for, that brings Gabriel’s junior year passing totals to 3,002 yards and 32 TDs. When you total all four of his years at Mililani, Gabriel’s corrected career passing yards in high school equals 10,133 yards and 105 TDs.

So what was the point of all this?

History matters. 

Facts matter. 

Stats have value, but the art of taking stats for football is a dying art in our state. People who want to get into the sports industry flock to the creative side of things with fancy cameras for social media reels, but stats and what you do on film is how players get recognized.

Our state needs more people willing to do this under appreciated job because the number of missing box scores have increased this season. Resources do exist for those wanting to learn, with legendary statistician Thomas Yoshida putting on multiple statistician workshops over the last decade that are archived on ScoringLive’s YouTube page.

Maybe I’m overreacting. But then again, I did just finish doing statistics for a missing box score of a game that happened seven years ago.