La Pietra's basketball team is now eligible to qualify for the Division II state tournament, a status that had been in question until Monday's meeting of the Hawai'i High School Athletic Association's executive board.

Last month, La Pietra successfully appealed to the Interscholastic League of Honolulu to be returned to Division II this upcoming season, after originally being promoted to DI last summer. But the deadline for the state's five leagues to declare their teams' classifications was in July.

State tournament berths are calculated and assigned to leagues based on those July declarations, so under HHSAA rules leagues are not allowed to add teams after the deadline.

But ILH president Rich Schaffer made a motion on Monday to allow La Pietra to become eligible for the DII tournament, with the understanding that his league will not gain any additional berths as a result of the Lady Panthers' move down from Division I.

The motion passed unanimously.