Prep column: Eagles returning to high altitude

Barry Faulkner

With its quest to earn a Pacific Coast League title this season,

the Estancia High girls basketball team is carrying a significant flag

for the school’s entire girls athletic department.

Coach Paul Kirby and his players are glaringly aware that a PCL crown

this season would be the program’s first league championship since 1991.

But a look at the rest of the girls sports at Estancia reveals a

widespread drought of almost similar proportion. Since 1991, a year in

which the Eagles won girls PCL titles in basketball, soccer, tennis and

track and field, exactly 50% of the total league crowns the school had

won collectively before that, only soccer (1993) has emerged atop PCL

foes.

This does not include coed badminton, which was a dominant program for

years under Lillian Brabander before dissolving in the mid-1990s.

Adding a unique quality to this year’s Estancia girls basketball team

is it’s seven-player roster. Additionally, Kirby does not have a

full-time assistant coach.

Kirby, whose team has battled foul trouble at times this season, said

he may call up a junior varsity player to add some much-needed depth. But

that decision is complicated by the fact that Coach Jung Butalid’s JV

squad is currently competing with six players.

“Our JV had a game this year when it started with five players and

ended the game with three on the court, because two had fouled out,�

Kirby said. “They still won the game by 15 points.�

The football staff at Corona del Mar has undergone more than a minor

shake-up with the decision by walk-on offensive coordinator Lyle Lansdell

to take a two-year sabbatical from the program in order to follow his

son’s final two years of high school football at Aliso Niguel.

Ed Blanton, a former Estancia head coach who had coached the secondary

and tight ends for the Sea Kings, will assume the offensive coordinator

position, while continuing his work with the secondary.

No new coach will be added, according to CdM Coach Dick Freeman, who

said he will probably work with the tight ends, in addition to

coordinating the defense.

Freeman said the Sea Kings’ offense will be simplified, but that had

already been planned before Landsell, whom Freeman expects to return,

left.

“The terminology will be the same, but there will be less stuff,�

Freeman said. “And, obviously, the system will reflect things Ed is more

comfortable with.�

One obvious change will be the elimination of early morning

quarterback meetings Lansdell conducted as a teaching tool for his

quarterbacks.

A long overdue correction: Based on information printed in the

tournament program, I reported the 35 points Estancia High senior guard

Fernando Maldonado scored against Whittier Christian (Dec. 26) were the

most by any Eagle in the 17-year history of the program’s Coast Classic.

However, Jon Cantrell scored 38 in a 2000 victory over Antelope Valley

Christian in the same tournament.

Correction II: I reported the Laguna Beach girls basketball team came

into this year’s league campaign with 53 straight PCL defeats. The

correct number was 41, now 45 after an 0-4 start this season.

The Estancia High girls soccer team (3-14, 0-5) may be having a rough

season, but the Eagles’ roster is all-world.

Among those competing for first-year coach Tom Williams, are junior

America Rangel and sophomore Asia Ingram. Adding to the geographical

theme is sophomore Aymed Toledo.

The aforementioned trio contribute to another roster quirk, with

one-third of the 21-player unit owning first names beginning with A.

And while the Eagles’ record indicates they have struggled to find

their “A game,� Costa Mesa Coach Dan Johnston indicated last week that

Williams is creating a dynamic that should eventually help the program

rebound from its current slump.