Queen of the Monarchs

Valery Brady looked around the gym and felt like leaving.

It was fall, during the first week of practice for the Valley College women’s basketball team, and Brady was the only sophomore on the floor.

The months ahead, she thought, would be no picnic.

“My fear was that it was a young team and that experience-wise it might be a long season,” Brady said. “I hadn’t played with them in the summer and when I came out for practice I got frustrated because they were still in the high school mode.”

Not anymore.

The Monarchs (26-9) are one step away from the state championships, which will be played March 7-9 in San Jose. They need a victory tonight at Chaffey (27-8) in a third-round game of the Southern California Regional to advance.

But it’s a big step. The Panthers beat Valley, 69-55, in the Orange Coast tournament in December.

At that time, however, the young Monarchs were still adjusting to each other and to college competition. The loss to Chaffey dropped them to 8-6, but they have sailed lately, winning their past 12 games and sweeping the Western State Conference South Division with a 10-0 record. Six of their defeats were against teams ranked in the top 10 in the state.

“We matured real well,” Brady said. “This team has a lot of heart. We all want to win so bad.”

No one on the team wants it more than Brady, a 5-foot-6 guard from Notre Dame High who is not Valley’s most athletically gifted player but is the most complete and consistent.

Brady, who was selected to the All-WSC South team that will be announced shortly, is averaging 16 points, four rebounds and three assists. She averaged 16.5 points in conference games and scored a team-high 25 points against Moorpark in an 84-63 playoff victory Tuesday.

“She always comes up big when we need her,” Valley Coach John Taylor said. “She’s very, very clutch. . . . She’s one of the toughest competitors I’ve ever been associated with.”

Even to the point of playing when hurt. Last season, Brady tried to play with a stress fracture in her right foot but gave in and missed 12 games. She returned to help the Monarchs into the second round of the regional.

“I’ve always been injury-prone,” said Brady, the Notre Dame girls’ career scoring leader with 708 points. “This is the first season that I’ve been totally healthy. I always had ankle sprains or thumb sprains, stuff like that in high school.”

Brady, a superstitious type, looked for wood after those remarks. She doesn’t like to upset the balance of things. On game days, for instance, she always dresses in the same order and even used to eat only turkey sandwiches for lunch, a ritual she discarded.

But one thing she didn’t give up was her spot with the Monarchs, even after the initial concerns about the team’s inexperience. She decided to lead with her actions--and a few choice words here and there.

“Sometimes they want me to be more vocal so every once in a while I surprise them,” Brady said. “I get them together and give them a little stern speech.”

The Monarchs will look for Brady to lead them tonight. She believes they are ready to follow.

“We played close to our best basketball during conference, but I think we are peaking now,” Brady said. “Coach tells us that if we want to fly [to San Jose] we have to run [fastbreak].”

For Brady, that’s a whole different kind of running than she wanted to do back in the fall.