UC IRVINE WOMEN’S BASKETBALL PREVIEW : Andrea Looks to Rebound From Humbling Experience

Last season, UC Irvine women’s basketball Coach Dean Andrea had his guards up.

Without a healthy center, with all but one of its regular players under 6-feet tall, with an inexperienced team in one of the best conferences, the Anteaters attacked with their guards. They gambled with full-court presses and three-point shots.

“It was really a lot of fun, but we just got our heads beaten in,” Andrea said.

The Anteaters finished 4-14 and in a three-way tie for seventh place in the 10-team Big West Conference. They were 9-20 overall, which was Andrea’s worst record since 1978--his first as Irvine coach.

The Big West coaches predicted last week that the Anteaters will finish eighth in the conference this season, but Andrea said he thinks the humbling experience of last season has made them better than that.

Natasha Parks, last year’s only senior who had a 14.6 points per game average at forward, has graduated. But three starting guards--Shurrell Johnson, Jenny Lee and Kathy Lizarraga--return, and the bench is improved.

Long-range gunners Lizarraga and Lee made 90 of Irvine’s conference-leading 92 three-point shots. Irvine attempted 57 more three-point shots than its nearest conference rival and led the conference in three-point percentage. Lizarraga, now a sophomore, took and made more three-pointers than any other Big West player.

To Andrea, those three-point shots represented desperate attempts to stay in games against taller, more-talented opponents.

Lee, now a junior, and Lizarraga got experience largely because Andrea didn’t have replacements. Even when they made mistakes, Andrea said, he couldn’t afford to pull them out.

Johnson, this year’s only senior, is a defensive specialist and three-year starter who will be looked to for leadership.

Geanine Hobbs, a 6-1 sophomore who finished last season at center--a position Andrea said she won by default--will start at forward.

The fact that Hobbs won’t have to play center again gives Andrea hope. Junior Shannon Unfred, who played sporadically last season because of back and neck injuries, is the starting center. Behind her are two 6-4 freshmen recruits, Kim Cox, from Livermore, Calif., and Cherie Birtwistle, from Victoria, British Columbia.

Andrea said he plans to play them all--sort of a “post position by committee”--because none is a complete center yet.

Saturday, the Anteaters gave Andrea a preview of what he can expect this season in a 64-60 victory over the English National Team. He received strong play off the bench from freshman Yvonne Catala, a 6-1, all-state forward from College Station, Tex. Catala, who averaged 24.4 points as a senior at A&M; Consolidated High, scored 17 points and had four rebounds in 22 minutes.

Irvine held a 40-26 advantage at halftime but suffered a cold spell in the second half, during which the Anteaters scored eight points in about 12 minutes. Andrea said similar offensive lapses took the Anteaters out of games last year.