By
Tony Lee
On
Wednesday, December 02, 2009
Head coach Mike Thornton said the Orange Coast College lady Pirates have been playing stressed out at the start of the season.
His goal at the third place game of the Santa Ana College Thanksgiving Tournament was for his players to be stress-free and relax on offense. The lady Pirates (4-3) did just that and responded with making a season-high 12 three pointers on Sunday (Nov. 29) to defeat Solano College, 81-50, at the Cook Gym.
"I'm a little bit of a perfectionist and have been a bit demanding," Thornton said. "Our goal today was to come out relaxed on offense and I think we did that today."Sophomore Jenna Lujan (pictured), who led the team with 16 points and eight rebounds Sunday, was named to the All-Tournament Team.
Thornton said that he asked Lujan to be more assertive on offense this season and this was the first time she did that this season.
"Coach has been talking about being more offensive minded - and not just defensive," Lujan said. "I'm still looking for my players, but firstly, looking for my layups and finishing strong."
Thornton was also impressed by her defense - especially against San Bernardino Valley College on Saturday.
"I think she had only nine points but took four charges," he said. "I think that's the most charges anyone has taken at Coast in a game."
Freshman Tiffany Montiero added 10 points off the bench and contributed two of the 12 three pointers on Sunday. Lujan converted three of the 12.
Coast's Sam Hansen scored nine points, Helena Robel scored eight and Alyssa Hanson and Michelle Yamasaski scored seven also.
"We have a lot of people that can play - we play about 12 people," Hanson said. "We have a lot of people rotating in-and-out, pretty quick."
Lujan also echoes that statement.
"It's cool knowing that we can all score," she said. "We don't have that one go-to-player. We can all drive, finish, make free throws so it just equals it all out."
OCC returns to action on Thursday (Dec. 3) at the Cuesta College Tournament against the College of the Redwoods, beginning at 3:30 p.m.
[Photo by Tony Lee]
By
Tony Lee
On
Tuesday, September 08, 2009
The top story for the Coast Report's Sept. 9 issue is "Coast axes intersession offers" and talks about Orange Coast College cutting intersession to allocate funds elsewhere.
This will affect OCC's women's basketball program more than other Coast sports since basketball is the only one that plays both fall and spring.
"Usually half our team takes intersession classes so the kids that are sophomores, they expected to have an opportunity to pick up a transferable class in the intersession, but that's not there," head coach Mike Thornton said.But even for the fall semester, many sophomores might have to go to OCC one more year because they have trouble getting into classes required for transfering."There are a couple classes...one's a chemistry class, I think, and there are only one or two of those classes offered," Thornton said. "Even though they had an early registration appointment, they didn't get in."Thornton added the team relied on donations for their Rebounder's Club and advertisements for team media guides. The school printed out a couple hundred guides and any excess copies were to come out of the donations and advertisements. But that's not the case this year."The only way (budget cuts) have affected it is we have to pay for all the printing," Thornton said. The budget cuts have hurt the lady Pirates on the court too."We had to cut back four games from our schedule, from 28 games to 24 games," he said.Thornton's team will play in five tournaments this year to try to make up the lost games. If the lady Pirates play in the maximum amount of games possible at the tournaments, they will play more than 28 games. Budget cuts have affected other Coast teams similarly also and this is just one exampleDuring the summer, Coast's Communications Director Jeff Hobbs said “I don’t think the programs themselves are going to see any drastic cuts as of now, but that could change."Well, at least they didn't axe one of the 21 sports program instead, but if how the women's basketball team is affected is a foreshadowing of things to come, I have a feeling I might be reporting a bigger story sooner than later.
[Photo courtesy of CartoonStock.com]
"I'm a little bit of a perfectionist and have been a bit demanding," Thornton said. "Our goal today was to come out relaxed on offense and I think we did that today."
