Doing It the Gray Way : Father, Son Combine to Build Ventura High Girls’ Basketball Program

Glenn Gray was eager to return to coaching basketball. His son, Glenn Gray Jr., was eager just to begin.

Both agree that the timing was right when they took over the varsity and junior varsity girls’ coaching positions at Ventura High in the 1988-89 season.

Together, they have helped guide the Cougars to two appearances in Southern Section finals in four seasons. Ventura had advanced to a final only once before the Grays’ arrival.

After falling a game short of the Division II-AA championship game last season, Ventura already is vigorously rebuilding. The Cougars play in the Century High tournament in Santa Ana this weekend.

The Cougars, who reached the final of the 24-team tournament last year, will play Fountain Valley in the first round. Peninsula, the State Division I champion, and Capistrano Valley and Woodbridge, Southern Section Division I-AA and II-AA semifinalists, also are entered.

Five seniors, including starters Becky Hantgin, Jesaca Lepper and Tina Eckberg, return for Ventura. And the junior varsity, which was 20-1, finished undefeated in Channel League play.

“That’s why we play during the summer--to gain experience,” said the elder Gray.

Gray, 53, employed as the Ventura County assistant tax assessor for the past 30 years, first coached at Ventura (on the junior varsity level) during the 1979-80 season, when his daughter Jennifer was a senior on the varsity. Gray coached the junior varsity for five seasons and the varsity for two seasons before stepping down in 1986.

Gray said he needed a break. He added he would not have returned without “the right help.”

Gray’s son, a guard on the Cougars’ last Channel League boys’ championship team as a senior in 1983, was hired as a social studies and English teacher at Ventura when Gray accepted his latest coaching job.

“I’m very lucky to have the opportunity to work for my dad, and for the both of us to build something,” said Gray Jr., 26, who coaches the junior varsity and assists on the varsity level.

Also enlisted to help was Felix Cortez, 27, an aide at Ventura and a teammate of Gray Jr. on the 1983 team. Two years ago, another former Ventura player, Joe Bova, 26, was brought aboard. Bova also is a teacher at his alma mater.

In coaching, there is strength in numbers.

“If you’re going to be a walk-on, you have to have people on campus to keep contact,” Buena Coach Joe Vaughan said. “I am at school to keep track, but (Gray) has the benefit of his assistants.”

There are other advantages to the Ventura coaching situation.

“It’s like having a coach there for each of us,” said Hantgin, a four-year varsity player. “During a game, one of them can tell you exactly what you need to do and work with you on a one-on-one basis.”

Gray relies on his assistants off the court as well.

“I put in a lot of time, but I attribute our overall success to those three guys who sit on the bench and give me advice,” Gray said. “They are on campus. They’re there during sixth period and see the girls during P.E. class and workouts for summer league.”

A special bond though, has formed between Gray and his son during the time they are together.

“Our relationship has matured,” Gray Jr. said. “It was hard at first. Father and son don’t always see eye to eye and communicate with each other. We deal with each other much better.”

From the start, Gray’s goal was to become competitive with Buena, which has won at least a share of 15 of the last 16 Channel League titles.

Three of Ventura’s four losses last season were to Buena, including a 42-41 defeat that gave the Bulldogs the league title. However, Ventura defeated the Bulldogs in the championship of the Buena tournament to become the first school other than Buena to win the tournament title in its 15-year history.

“Ventura has always been good and among the top three teams in league, but it’s really become evident over the past few seasons,” Vaughan said. “It’s become a rivalry.”

Ventura forfeited six games because of an ineligible player and finished 10-13 in Gray’s first season. The following season, Ventura (20-11) reached the 4-AA final and earned a berth in the Southern California regional tournament.

In the 1990-91 season, Ventura shared the league title with Buena. The Cougars (25-5) set a school record for wins, finishing a victory short of the state Division II-AA title game.

“We have gotten our share of luck and I’ve think we’ve surprised some people (in Los Angeles and Orange County),” said Gray, who has compiled a 46-9 record the past two seasons.

What has been lacking, however, is a Southern Section title.

Twice the Cougars have fallen in the title game in the Southern Section final to the top-seeded team. Ventura lost to Muir in 1990 and Brea-Olinda in ’91. Ventura (21-4) was seeded second last season, but wasted an 11-point first-half lead in a II-AA semifinal loss to Tustin.

“Everybody was disappointed,” Lepper said. “We let it slip away. All we needed to do was play hard to the end to make it to the final and we didn’t do that.”

But while championships have slipped away, the players seem convinced Ventura would not have advanced as far as it did without Gray, nicknamed “Bucko” by the players, and his son, nicknamed “Little Gray.”

“They use different approaches,” Hantgin said. “The son is more outgoing and the father is pretty stubborn, but they both care about you and use basketball as an example in life that if you try hard, you can be successful.”