New champs on block

Mike Sciacca

It is safe to say that no final buzzer has sounded as sweet to a

Laguna Beach High girls’ basketball team, than the one that ended the

Breakers’ 53-30 Pacific Coast League rout of host University on Feb.

3.

It put a dramatic exclamation point on a historic moment for the

program which, at that very moment, had just finished putting the

finishing touches on the school’s first league championship in the

sport.

Ever.

Needless to say, it was a feeling of euphoria for the Breakers,

who celebrated on the Trojans’ home floor.

“I just stood around scratching my head for about half an hour,

thought a lot about the last six years and all of the things and

people that were involved in getting us to that point,” Laguna coach

Stacy Howard said of the game’s aftermath. “Just watching the kids

and parents enjoy the moment was great. Just such a sense of

happiness for the kids and the parents, especially those who have put

their blood sweat and tears into it over the last few years.”

One of those players is Andrea “Vinnie” Ventura, the only senior

on the team, a player whom Howard says is the “backbone of the team

structure.”

The team’s starting center, Ventura has played at the varsity

level for three years.

During her freshman year, she played on the junior varsity squad.

“Oh my gosh, it’s just so unbelievable and mind-boggling to think

that we won a league championship,” she said. “For me, I’ve been in

this program for the past four years, and have watched it grow from

scratch.

“Last year was a breakthrough year in making CIF and now, this

year, we win a league title. Everyone on this team has worked so hard

to get to this point. It’s just great.”

Ventura said she caught a glimpse of the team’s potential on an

early season trip to Utah, when the team played, she said, “something

like” 15 games in a four-day period.

“We just bonded and I saw the talent on this team,” she said.

“After that trip, I just felt that we’d win the league title.”

Bold thoughts for a program that hadn’t handled championship

hardware before.

But the Breakers proved Ventura right, although Laguna hit a few

bumps in the road en route to the title.

The Breakers had two first round losses but by the time they

played at University on Feb. 3, they had a one-game lead on the

Trojans in the league standings.

The 23-point triumph over the Trojans left little doubt as to who

was No. 1, and created a two-game lead for the Breakers in the league

standings, with a game left on the schedule.

The Breakers trailed University, 11-10, after one quarter, but

outscored the Trojans, 29-9, between the second and third quarters,

to take command.

Claire Bevacqua led all scorers with 27 points and Breakers

teammate Brittany Clark scored 18.

The game was never in doubt in the fourth quarter.

All that was left, once the final buzzer went off, was for the

Breakers to let off some steam that had been pent up for the last 31

years.

“It was nice to share with everyone,” Howard said. “My parents

were even there from Colorado, so it was great to share it with them,

as well.”

Like Ventura, Howard said she had a premonition of a potential

league title in 2005.

“Yeah, I did,” she admitted. “We talked about winning league last

summer and it wasn’t just something we talked about, it was a goal

that Dan (assistant coach Dan Breece) and I felt was very realistic

for this group.”

Now that the program has had a taste of “ winning it all,” Howard

said she not only hopes that it can be in the thick of the league

title chase every year, but expects it to be, as well.

“I would be monumentally surprised if we weren’t in the thick of

it from here on out,” she added. “This program has a recent history

of raising the bar of expectations each year and of meeting and

exceeding those expectations.

“I see no reason why that wouldn’t continue to happen. We’ve got a

group of kids right now that expect to win, and that will win you a

lot of games.”