High-Flying Glenn Eagles Aim for League Crown : Basketball: Driven by their hard-nosed coach, girls make up for lack of height with intense, aggressive play.

On the basketball floor, with their flushed cheeks and flying hair, they don’t quite seem the same friendly girls who get great grades, dominate homecoming courts, lead student government and win popularity contests at Glenn High School in Norwalk.

In their varsity uniforms and in the hands of their relentless coach and his three assistants, they become intimidators. They gang up on dazed opponents, rip the ball from them and run them into submission.

“Everybody knows what a game face is,” said senior star Angelina Marin.

In Glenn’s 76-29 victory over Norwalk High last week, a halftime lead of 42-9 was not enough for Coach Richard Drake. “We’ve got to keep up the intensity,” he urged. “It’s 0-0 starting the third quarter.”

At practice this week in Glenn’s gleaming new gym, as the Eagles prepared for Friday’s Suburban League championship game at home against Artesia, Drake reminded them of the 80-64 loss in the first game between the teams.

“They thumped your butt,” he said.

“Don’t remind me,” guard Stella Lopez said.

“And,” Drake went on, “don’t forget the elated celebration they had at the end of the game.”

“Not this time--they gonna be cryin’,” said junior forward Faye Hagan, the student body vice president who had 16 steals against Norwalk.

Glenn was 18-4 overall and 7-1 in the league before Wednesday night’s game against Mayfair, a far cry from four years ago when Drake took over a team that had lost 51 consecutive games.

“The girls asked me to take it over and I figured I didn’t have anything to lose,” said Drake, who at the time was the boys JV coach. “Then when someone told me it was the biggest mistake I could make, I accepted the challenge.”

The Eagles were 10-10 in his first season, 12-9 two years ago and 18-7 last season when they went to the CIF Southern Section playoff quarterfinals.

“Before he started coaching, we always got slaughtered by the powerhouses, Bellflower and Artesia,” senior forward Karina Peregrina said. “People used to ask us, ‘How much did you lose by?’ Now they ask us, ‘How much did you win by?’ ”

When Drake became coach, he warned that he would be tough. Unable to cope with his tirades, some players cried.

“That had to change,” said Drake, 38, a broad-backed former pitcher for Cerritos College. “If I jumped on somebody, I would tell them, ‘I don’t want tears, I want points.’ Eventually they’ve learned how to let it go in one ear and out the other, to hear the most important stuff and not take it so personal.”

Guard Caprice Fimbres, the team assists leader with 69, said, “If we knew we couldn’t take what he says, we’d quit. He makes you stronger.”

Playing against the boys JV team helps too, as does scrimmaging with assistant coach Bret Hogue, a former pro player in Europe.

“I coach these girls just like boys,” Drake said. “You need to coach them aggressively. These girls learn how to bump. I’ve been told by other coaches in our league that I teach too physical a game. That’s too bad. Join the club then.”

The fast-breaking Eagles win despite not having a player taller than 5 feet 10. “I believe an in-your-face trap defense can make up for lack of height,” Drake said.

The team is led by Marin, who has been hampered by injuries this season but is still the school’s all-time leading scorer with 1,456 points, and Hagan, who is averaging 20 points and 12 rebounds a game.

Off the court, the Eagles are among the most popular girls in the school. Fimbres was homecoming queen and Peregrina and guards Agnes Guarin and Arlene Salgado were princesses. Guarin is student body president and was voted most-photogenic senior. Peregrina is student activities director.

And most of the players have grade-point averages above 3.4.

“We are a unique team, I think,” Fimbres said, “because everyone’s different in personality but we all like go (do things) together.”

To change the attitude toward girls basketball at Glenn, Drake started a hall of fame. He also displays school records in the locker room.

“You develop pride in the program,” he said. “We’re not in the category of Palos Verdes or Morningside, but we’re getting there. We have a good freshman and JV squad, and a 6-5 girl transferring in next year who’s going to be in the eighth grade. A lot of people think it’s going to end at the end of this year and I’ve got news for them. It’s just starting.”

Despite the success, the defeats of the past still have an effect. “Because we’ve been beaten year after year by Artesia, it’s like we have a mental block when we play them,” Drake said.

Recognition does not come easily to Glenn, and that discourages Drake. “As soon as we lost to Artesia, we dropped out of the Top 10,” Drake said. “We don’t have the name. Faye Hagan is an excellent player and yet not one local college has expressed interest in her.”

Drake’s other assistants are Darryl Adams and Wes Phillips. Drake said that players prefer to talk to Adams. “I hate to say this, but they fear me because I’m a butt kicker,” Drake said. “I try to make sure I’m just their coach. I don’t want to be a buddy. With girls that’s very hard to do because they have this closeness they want.

“I treat every girl the same. There isn’t a girl here who hasn’t been scolded by me, but there’s not a girl here who hasn’t got a hug from me and told she’s done a nice job.”

This apparent softness beneath a hard veneer is verified by Drake’s players.

“A girl who was here last year called him Hitler,” Hagan said. “But he’s a lot like a teddy bear. He’s like a dad to all of us.”

But Drake is not a favorite among other coaches in the Suburban League. “When you’re up by 20 or 30 points and continue pressing, that’s running up the score,” said one coach who asked not to be named.

The Eagles average 62 points a game and hold their opponents to an average of 43.

“I just beat Bellflower, 81-58,” Drake said, “but I remember watching Bellflower beat our girls, 80-something to 12. Now that’s running it up.”

But Norwalk Coach Mitch Crist does not blame Drake for the 47-point margin in last week’s game. “I haven’t had a problem with him,” Crist said. “He’s got a good club and they play hard.”

Drake is trying to decide if he should move on, a decision made tougher when he sees the uplifting spirit the school has taken on. Like his team, it has made a comeback--from the depressing period two years ago when football star Juan Enriquez, who was Caprice Fimbres’ boyfriend, was killed in a shooting, and the gym burned down a few weeks later.

And Drake is torn by the satisfaction that his team has given him: “It’s the most rewarding job I’ve ever done. Girls give back a smile. They try so hard. Boys think they already know it.”

On Tuesday afternoon, the Eagles gathered for their team photo around a luxury car.

“Our last picture,” Angelina Marin said sadly as she sat on the grass. “I don’t even want to think about graduation.”

To Drake, with the game against first-place Artesia (8-0 in the league) looming, this was a distraction that ate into valuable practice time.

The day before he had said, “They better be totally focused or it’s curtains and we take second place--what a shame to take second with a 19-5 record.”

But he held a basketball and posed patiently anyway with his close-knit girls, who, as they horsed around in their earrings and fresh lipstick, refused to share his worried look.