Thanks all for the perspective. - I had glazed over the fact that one-way in Y is just 10k miles!
The reason I'm searching for Saver class availability is because the LAX-LIH ticket will replace a partner award ticket that my parents partially traveled. Partner awards can only be combined with AS so I don't think I can book AA awards.
Although the AS website shows AS awards at 40k miles, not all of these are saver awards. That's why EF is the only way to search for AS [saver]* awards AFAIK.
I will ping EF to check whether their search tool will work properly early next week. My plan is to secure 2 Y saver seats flying midweek for now. - Seems like midweek has the best chance of F award space opening up.
For the return (LIH-LAX), only AA, HA, and UA offer non-redeye flights. The best deal there seems to be 13k Avios for the AA flight.
*Updated to clarify
Last edited by eethan; Feb 27, 2021 at 10:46 pm