Injuries not an issue for this time for Glendale women’s basketball
With her, it might have won the Pan-Armenian Games.
Without her, it was left settling for a silver medal.
Christine Kepenekian couldn’t do much to help the Glendale women’s basketball team in the fifth annual Pan-Armenian Games in 2011. The former Burbank High standout tore the anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee during the annual Homenetmen Navasartian Games in July and missed the international games in August, when Glendale lost to Tehran, 86-67, in the championship game.
PHOTOS: Glendale women’s basketball team preps for Pan-Armenian games
Four years later, Kepenekian’s left knee is strong, Glendale has five returners from the 2011 squad and its players are confident that they’ll be on the top of the podium wearing the gold medals instead of their chief rival, Tehran.
“We’re going to win,” stated guard Ella Stepanian, a Crescenta Valley High graduate who has had her share of knee injuries as well, tearing the ACL in both knees, just like Kepenekian. “We’re going there for a championship.”
Kepenekian, who signed a contract to play with Hatis Yerevan, the top women’s professional basketball team in Armenia, but had to retire after tearing her ACL, said it was tough to sit back and watch her teammates four years ago.
“I feel like we had a great opportunity to win gold four years ago and we have a great opportunity to win it this year,” Kepenekian said.
Kepenekian gives Glendale its best opportunity to win the competition, which runs from Aug. 2-13.
The women’s team will play three pool-play games in three days. It will start Tuesday against Ararat (Armenia), followed by games against Alexandria (Egypt) and Stepanakert, the capital of Nagorno-Karabakh Republic. The playoff rounds begin Aug. 9.
Kepenekian’s experience, skills and leadership should play a vital role on a small but quick Glendale squad that includes Flora Gabrielyan (played at Cal State Dominguez Hills), Mariam Asaryan (played at L.A. Valley College), and Ani Ebrahimian and Melanie Samvalian, both Crescenta Valley High graduates.
“We have the experience and we have depth,” Stepanian said. “I’m very confident we’re going to win, but not to the point where we’re going to disrespect the other teams.”
Added Gabrielyan: “We’re going to have to be a smarter team. We have a lot of players who can attack.”
The small lineup, which features the 6-foot Stepanian as the tallest player, will feature an up-tempo offensive system installed by coach Martik Ghookasian, the former Hoover High girls’ basketball coach who is the program manager for the Homenetmen Glendale Ararat Chapter’s basketball developmental league.
“We’re a guard-orientated team,” Ghookasian said. “We need to pass the ball well, we need to shoot the ball well and we need to defend well.”