COLLEGE DIVISION NOTEBOOK / MARTIN BECK : This Season, Chapman Women Expect Playoffs

Before last season, the Chapman women’s basketball team was surprised to learn that it wasn’t eligible for the NCAA Division III playoffs. A technicality involving the program’s switch from Division II kept the Panthers from being considered.

Chapman then had a good-enough season--16-8 with victories over several teams that made the NCAA tournament--that it might have had a chance to play in the postseason.

This season, the Panthers’ goal is to make sure the possibility becomes a reality.

“We’re calling our games 24 steps to the playoffs,” Chapman Coach Mary Hegarty said. “Being an independent, you can’t just cruise through the preseason, kick butt in league and go to the playoffs.”

Hegarty says she believes 18 victories will virtually assure a postseason spot for the Panthers, ranked 16th in a preseason Division III poll.

Hegarty, in her third season, has made rapid progress with a program that was 2-23 the season before she took over. The Panthers were 6-18 in her first season.

“Our first year, we didn’t know how to win,” Hegarty said. “Our second year, we were learning to win. This year, we need to get to the point were we are expecting to win.

“Not that we should have the attitude that we can just show up and win, but that we know we can beat teams and we attack them from the beginning.”

The Panthers passed their first test, beating Redlands, 78-63, Tuesday. Last season, they beat the Bulldogs, 66-60, in the opener.

The Panthers, who don’t have a player taller than 5 feet 10, will again depend on pressure defense and the fast break. Hegarty had brought in two taller players, but one quit and the other, Judit Nagy, a 6-2 post player, ruptured her Achilles’ tendon and will sit out the season.

So Chapman will count on players such as 5-10 Alana Conyers, 5-10 Shawna Parkinson, 5-10 Kathy Kaupu and 5-10 Melissa Starr to play inside.

Despite the loss of Melody Earle, the program’s third-leading scorer, the Panthers will be strong on the perimeter. Monique Sweet and Faye Cruz both have impressed Hegarty early.

Maureen Fox, a transfer from Shoreline Community College in Washington, is the starting point guard and Flo Luppani, from Orange Coast, is the backup.

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Coach David Wolter, who led Concordia (18-14, 8-4 in the Golden State Athletic Conference) to a second-place finish in his first season, is optimistic about his second.

The Eagles have a solid core of returning players, including starters Audre Moss, a 6-0 forward who was an all-conference selection as a freshman, Kara Stephens, a senior guard, and Kristin Weddick, a sophomore guard.

Wolter’s teams play pressure defense all over the court, aiming to unleash a prolific offense. He hopes this one will be able to improve on the Eagles’ average of about 80 points a game last season.

In his first full recruiting season, Wolter was able to attract players who fit the Eagles fast-paced style. Freshman guard Dinah Shah was the Freeway League player of the year at Troy High. Freshman guard Jaime Gast was an All-Southern Section Division I selection at Diamond Bar. Junior forward Angela Sather was an all-region pick at Pima Community College in Arizona.

Wolter says the team has come together quickly, but still needs seasoning because nine of the 12 players on the roster are freshmen or sophomores.

“The inexperience is something we are going to have to battle through,” he said. “Some days, we look like the Lakers; some days we look like Phegley Junior High School.”

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By the end of last season, the Southern California College women’s basketball team was worn down. With only seven players getting most of the playing time, the Vanguards lost two games in the final week of the regular season to finish fourth in the GSAC at 7-5. After losing to Biola in the first round of the conference playoffs, they finished 17-13.

In his fourth season at SCC, Coach Dean Cooper has brought in his biggest recruiting class to try to address the late-season stamina problem.

This year, he says, SCC will be 10 or 11 deep. SCC was picked to finished second in the GSAC in a poll of conference coaches, but Cooper says the Vanguards are still struggling with their team chemistry.

“It’s really weird,” he said. “We’re so inconsistent. I don’t know if it’s because we are so new. One day we look fantastic and I get all excited about it and the next day we look like a different team.”

SCC is especially deep at post with 6-2 sophomore Heather Woodruff, a first-team all-conference pick; 6-0 sophomore Elaine Whittemore and 6-0 junior Gina Jojola, a transfer from Chaffey College. Lisa Weaver, a 5-11 freshman from Woodbridge High, was also expected to play post, but she suffered a serious knee injury and is out for the season.

The Vanguards have quite a few candidates to fill the other positions. Sophomore Alisha Blomker, who started at point, and junior Erin Hartigan, the first wing player off the bench, will be pushed by transfers Jody Caruso, a guard from Cypress; Angela Minor, a forward from Cal State Stanislaus; Carrie Burt, a guard from Saddleback; and Stephanie Werdel, a guard from Cypress. Returning reserves Amber Chaney, a sophomore; Ruth Gulfan, the team’s only senior; and freshmen Alana Kempton (Whittier Christian) and Stephanie Sick (Julian) are also expected to get a chance for significant playing time.

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Kelly Martinez is Pacific Christian’s fifth women’s coach in five seasons, but she promises to stick around. The college has shown its commitment to the program by hiring her full time. Martinez, 27, who as Kelly Stephenson played for Villa Park High and Occidental College, also is the associate athletic director and sports information director.

The Royals (1-1) are led by Margarita Ramos, a 5-8 senior who was a National Christian College Athletic Assn. All-American as a sophomore. She is joined by senior point guard Patience White, 6-0 freshman center Brandi Christianson, sophomore forward Becky Snavely and sophomore guard Stacey Bennett in the starting lineup.

Notes

The Pacific Christian men’s soccer team finished sixth at the National Christian College Athletic Assn. Division I tournament last week in Cleveland, Tenn. The Royals, who were the Division II runners-up last season, lost to top-seeded Judson (Ill.), 4-0, in the first round, beat Western Baptist (Ore.), 3-0, on goals by Ryan Bean, in their second game and lost, 5-1, to Bartlesville Wesleyan (Okla.) in the fifth-place game. . . . Mary Cahill, who became Chapman’s winningest women’s volleyball coach this season, was selected the West Region Coach of the Year by the American Volleyball Coaches Assn. Cahill, who is 127-96 in seven seasons at Chapman, surpassed Penny Brush, now the associate athletic director, who was 126-112 in 11 seasons. . . . Shawna Parkinson, Shanea Bishop, Lori Fuller and Addy Benard were each named to the all-region team for the Panthers, who advanced to their second consecutive NCAA Division III playoff berth.