By Tadzio Garcia
Huskies on the brink of playoff berths
The Huskies have an opportunity to send both the men’s and women’s basketball teams to the playoffs for the first time in over a decade.
With two games remaining in the regular season, the men’s basketball team will make the playoffs while the women’s team is on the cusp.
The women’s team is 15-10 overall and will finish at Long Beach City College, 21-4 overall and Mt. San Antonio College (27-0), the top ranked team in the state. The Huskies are ranked No. 14 in the South Region poll.
With a 15-12 record, ELAC could get one of the final at-large bids. Last year the first round of the playoffs included the bottom four seeds in two games, with two teams advancing to the second round to play the tournament’s top two seeds.
The Huskies are led by De Laura Castanada and Dioselene Lopez who are both top-ten scorers in the South Coast Conference. Castanada is in the No. 3 spot scoring an average 13.0 points per game. Lopez is No. 7 with in the SCC averaging 12.1 ppg.
The No. 10-ranked (both polls) men’s basketball team is in the playoffs based on their record and ranking. The question is their playoff seeding. The Huskies are 18-7 overall, 7-0 at home scoring an average of 18 points per win.
On the road the Huskies suit up a different team, which currently has a three-game skid after losing to Long Beach (10-16 overall) and El Camino (8-14) colleges and to El Camino College Compton Center (10-12).
John Mosley, first year head coach repeatedly said throughout the season, “Any team can beat any team in the state on any given day.” The Huskies will have to find a way to break that excuse if they hope to advance out of their first playoff game.
Mosley has however led the Huskies to its best season in years. The Huskies beat a tough L.A. Trade Tech team last Wednesday. After a tight first half, the Huskies closed the door on Tech and won, 63-41. Just before that, LATT put a scare to Mt. SAC (24-2) before losing by 14 points.
In 2008, the Huskies beat SCC rival Mt. SAC twice, 75-55 and 68-63. The Huskies have a chance to repeat that conference feat. They travel to Mt. SAC on Wednesday to face the state’s No. 2-ranked team.
The Huskies stunned the Mounties 77-70 at ELAC one month ago.
The track and field team found themselves in familiar territory with seven statewide top-ten results after their first meet at the Mt. SAC Season Opener on Friday, Feb. 8.
The difference this year is that those results were not from four-time All-American Shawnta Barnes who graduated and attends Cal State Northridge on scholarship.
Instead, 10 different Huskies posted several top statewide results including the men’s 4 x 100 relay team, an event that the Huskies usually don’t sport.
Returning veteran Olivia Reyes has the fastest time in the state in the women’s 3,000-meter steeplechase. Gonzalo Ceja has the sixth fastest statewide time in the men’s steeplechase.
Batters post four wins in five games
The baseball team, ranked No. 12 in the Southern California preseason poll started the season with two losses to No. 9-ranked Riverside City College.
The Huskies bounced back this weekend in San Diego to pull even at 4-4 overall after a split at Grossmont College, and a win at Southwestern College.
The softball team is riding a two-game win streak at home after opening the season with four losses on the road. ELAC opened SCC play with a 7-6 win over Pasadena last Tuesday.
With the crowd vocally in the game, sophomore Megan Coronado drove in the winning run, unearned with two outs in the bottom of the seventh inning in the see-saw emotional battle.
The Huskies stunned Antelope Valley College, ranked No. 13 in the preseason poll, 7-4 off of a four-run fifth inning.
Splash makes waves
The women’s swim team opened the season with a splash as they hosted the SCC Pentathlon, the first non-dual in over twelve years held in the famed ELAC pool last Friday. The Huskies came in sixth in a field of nine. Pasadena came in first winning all of the individual races.
Many American records have been set in the ELAC pool, known by many as one of the fastest pools in the nation.
The diving team opened the season on Saturday at El Camino but results were not available by the Campus News deadline.
Greg Pate is my brother.