La Quinta Updates Its Image to Reflect This Decade, Coach

He was welcomed with a delicate mix of enthusiasm and skepticism. In the heady 1980s, La Quinta girls’ basketball was as sassy and successful as a booming economy. But the heydays were short-lived, for the GNP and for the Aztecs.

“You could probably call us the team of the ‘80s,” second-year Coach Tony Tubbs said. “They won the Southern Section (4-A) championship in 1990, and they had a 55-game winning streak.”

Winning streaks--the 55-game run from the 1984-85 season to the end of the 1989-90 year; league championships--nine in a row from 1982 to 1990; a section title and a section runner-up--in 1985. That all came to a screeching halt when Kevin Kiernan left, after the 1989-90 season, to coach the Savanna boys’ team.

After Kiernan’s departure, continuity wasn’t an Aztec strength. La Quinta coaches came and went.

“Last year was a feeling-out process for the players and the coach,” Tubbs said. “For some of the fourth-year girls, I was their third coach in four years. So when I came in and told them I wanted to rebuild the program, their response was, ‘Yeah, yeah. We’ve heard it all before.’ ”

Linda Rodriguez was one senior doing a lot of listening. She said Tubbs was only partially right. Including summer programs, she and the rest of La Quinta’s seniors have played for five coaches.

“I did sort of think, oh gosh, here’s another coach,” Rodriguez said. “But I didn’t think about if he’d be leaving or not.”

Now would certainly be an inopportune time. Having recently won their first Garden Grove League championship in four years, the Aztecs are playoff bound and on a roll. La Quinta won 15 consecutive games before Rancho Alamitos, the 1993 Division III-A finalist, halted the streak last week and created co-champions.

But in the long run, the loss may have helped the Aztecs, who open Division III-AA play Saturday with a first-round game against No. 2 Empire League entry El Dorado.

“It was a tough loss, but in a way, I think it helped us,” said Rodriguez, a 5-foot-7 guard who is averaging 21.3 points, 7.1 rebounds, 4.1 assists and shoots 33.2% from three-point range. “It made us realize we aren’t too good, people can beat us.”

Although not many have. La Quinta (19-5) came within one game of its goal of an undefeated league season, an aspiration Tubbs believed was too lofty at the beginning of the season.

“When we had our meeting to go over team goals, we talked about working hard, winning league, going to (the playoffs),” he said. “Then, some of the girls started talking about 14-0. That surprised me because I believed it, but I didn’t know they believed it.”

Last year, no one believed much of anything positive.

“Last year, we had a good team, but we just couldn’t find a way to get it together, to play as a team,” said Rodriguez. “We were all a bunch of individuals. We always fought. This year, we decided we wanted to work hard and play together. If we did those things, we’d be on a winning team. We just won’t accept losing.”

It was a learning process for everyone. Rodriguez admitted Tubbs lacked the varsity experience he needed to pull the Aztecs together.

“He didn’t know that much,” she said.

But he became self-taught. He watched what the best teams were doing, and he borrowed their ideas.

“When I came in I wanted to build a successful program,” Tubbs said. “But I didn’t know what a successful program was all about until I saw the Breas, the winning programs.”

He set up a feeder program, a summer camp, and he encouraged the girls to coach on their own.

Then, after last season’s record of 13-9, 6-8 on the heels of a 6-14, 4-10 mark the year before, Tubbs felt his team start to sense his commitment.

“And they started reacting to that,” he said. “Fall workouts went well. There was a lot of transition, but now there’s a sense of stability. I have a passion for it, I’m committed to building a program, and I think the girls know that.”

Division III-AA at a Glance

Defending champion: Inglewood Morningside.

Top-seeded teams: Brea-Olinda (25-0), Morningside (19-5), South Pasadena (16-3), South Torrance (17-6).

Dark horse: La Quinta (19-5). La Quinta faces El Dorado in the first round and could do some damage in subsequent rounds if the Aztecs are playing well.

Top players: Sarah Beckley (Brea-Olinda), Cheryl Dickson (Morningside), Michelle de Bruijn (El Dorado), Shelley Dungo (Torrance Bishop Montgomery), Nicole Erickson (Brea-Olinda), Genevieve Evarts (Newport Harbor), Rhonda Gondringer (La Quinta), Gina Heads (Newport Harbor), Colleen Hudson (Brea-Olinda), Nadia Hoerner (Fullerton), Ashley Jones (Fullerton), Brooke Koehler (La Habra), Lee Moulin (Brea-Olinda), Shanna Renken (El Dorado), Linda Rodriguez (La Quinta), Jamie Sweet (El Dorado), Whitney Torregano (Magnolia).

Best draw: Newport Harbor (19-6). Not being on Brea’s side of the draw is a blessing to begin with. The Sea View League’s second-place team could go to the semifinals, where a rematch of last year’s semifinal against Morningside might go Newport Harbor’s way.

Worst draw: Fullerton (14-9). More putty for first-round opponent Brea.

Notes: Brea this week moved up to No. 2 in the USA Today national rankings. . . . Perennial powerhouse Morningside graduated four of last year’s starters but always manages to field a championship team. . . . La Quinta was riding high on a 15-game winning streak before Garden Grove League rival Rancho Alamitos burst the Aztecs’ bubble with two regular-season games left.

Division III-A at a Glance

Defending champion: Costa Mesa (now in Division IV-AA).

Top-seeded teams: Lompoc (19-4), Ojai Nordhoff (19-4), Rancho Alamitos (19-6), Covina (17-4).

Dark horse: La Canada (11-11). Last year, as the No. 1 team from the Rio Hondo League, La Canada lost to Rancho Alamitos in the semifinals. Not much expected of the third-place Spartans in 1994.

Top players: Maria Camacho (Whittier Pioneer), Laura Czingula (Estancia), Adrienne Davis (Lompoc Cabrillo), Michelle Frank (Rancho Alamitos), Avion Harris (Bellflower), Christen King (San Dimas), Tara Knesel (Bellflower), Julie Littman (Rancho Alamitos), Nicole Lynch (Cabrillo), Rachel McSorley (Nordhoff), Colleen Mitchell (Lompoc), Angie Payne (San Luis Obispo), Akilah Rodgers (Rancho Alamitos), Susan Stitt (San Dimas), Gretchen Wachter (Nordhoff), Jessica Waltz (Estancia), Dawn Wood (Pioneer), Kimberly Wuest (Lompoc).

Best draw: Rancho Alamitos. First-round opponent is a third-place team and the Vaqueros match up better against Bellflower or Estancia, their second-round foe.

Worst draw: Cabrillo (13-12). Conquistadores have three times as many losses as Lompoc, their cross-town rivals.

Notes: Have to wonder about the strength of a division where top-seeded Lompoc lost to Westminster, the fifth-place team in the Sunset League, 42-35, early in the season, and where second-seeded Nordhoff lost to Mater Dei by 41 points. . . . Although only two county teams were in this division last year, both were finalists. This year, Rancho Alamitos and Estancia are in the bottom half of the draw but there’s no county representation in the top half. . . . Rancho Alamitos should be spurred by healthy Michelle Frank and Julie Littman, who were injured during different parts of the season.