PV Basketball Ready For The Competition
• Sea Kings move up a division and will face tougher competition than last season.
The girl’s varsity basketball team at Palos Verdes High has an 8-4 record so far this year and is tied for 16th place in the 2A Division in the California Interscholastic Federation Southern Section. The team moved up to the tougher 2A Division from 3AA Division it played in last year
“I think that the team will continue to get better and grow,“ said senior and captain Djae Berberabe. “However,” she said, “as we go further into the season…the competition will get harder, but I think we will still be able to make it to CIF playoffs.”
One of the biggest strengths and weaknesses is the number of new faces on the team this year. The team lost five seniors from last year, with four of the five being starting players who played a prominent role on the team. In addition, the team has a new assistant coach, Rico Emnace, who players say has helped the team improve on both defense and offense.
“This year we have some inexperienced varsity players who are slowly coming along and always asking for help because they want to play their best,” said senior and co-captain Ebun Kalejaiye. “It is a lot of teaching, but it really puts seniors in the leadership position one would expect.”
Berberabe added that the team has had to deal with adversity on the court. “Losing the seniors has affected us because we dropped in height and have been struggling to get back into the flow with a different starting lineup,” Berberabe said.
However, the team has put an emphasis on building team chemistry, using team dinners to increase the time they spend together to form stronger bonds with one another.
“Even though we range from seniors to sophomores, we all love hanging out with each other and talking,” said Kalejaiye.
“We work out together, eat together, and then play together. The younger players respect us seniors as they should, but at the end of the day, we are all working towards the same goal and we know that working together is the only way to succeed,” she said.
