Palisades-News-March-18-2015

Palisades News
Page 16 March 18, 2015
Hoops Coach Johnson Savors City Title
By SUE PASCOE
Editor
After winning the City Section Open Division
championship on March 7, Palisades High girls
basketball coach Torino Johnson said, “I’d like
to make a new dictionary. I’d put in the word team,
and below it I’d put a picture of my girls. They define
that word.”
By the same token, many would put down the word
“coach” and then put Johnson’s photo next to it. This
soft-spoken coach, who works as a special education aide
at PaliHi, has helmed the girls program for eight years.
The Dolphins beat Narbonne 60-56 in the final,
winning the first open-division basketball playoffs in
City history. Johnson said the new division was created
to allow the best teams to play more competitive games.
Johnson was reflective before practice, preparing for
his team’s State playoff opener by watching a taped game
from early November. The large City trophy sat on his
desk in a closet-sized office.
“We don’t need hardware to be champions,” he said.
“We control our own destiny by winning or losing.”
To make it to the finals against Narbonne, Palisades
overcame a 17-point, third-quarter deficit to defeat
Fairfax. Johnson was asked what he told his team during
a key timeout. “I told them to have fun,” he said. “Playing
should be fun, it shouldn’t be a job.”
Johnson’s philosophy was tested two days after their
championship game. As a Section winner, the Dolphins
were scheduled to open the State playoffs at home
against second-seeded Mater Dei, the number-one
ranked girls team in the nation. Mater Dei had been
PaliHi head girls basketball coach Torino Johnson looks
for challenges for his team, and in the process pushes his
girls to success.
Photo: Bart Bartholomew
The Dolphins celebrate the 60-56 win over Narbonne, which clinched the first City Section Open Division championship.
Photo: Bart Bartholomew
upset by Chaminade. But Monday afternoon, Johnson
was told the game had been moved to the Monarchs’
court in Santa Ana.
“In one way it’s a lack of respect [to take away the
home advantage], but I get it,” Johnson said. “If Mater
Dei loses to Chaminade, is that an actual loss? I can’t
get involved in the politics. We will go to their place and
do what we can do. We look at this as an opportunity,
rather than an adversity.”
Reflecting the life lessons he tries to impart on his
players, Johnson said: “We can’t control the place or
time, but we can control how well we shoot and how
well we play.”
A graduate of Manual Arts and USC (2005), Johnson
doesn’t back down. “I never schedule bad teams—there
are no cream puff games here,” he said. His young team
had only three seniors when it played Mater Dei in the
second game of the season and was thrashed, 74-32.
He called the second chance to play Mater Dei, “an
exciting position for us,” despite his team’s underdog
status. At Mater Dei, a private school, athletics is king
and money is pumped into the program and facilities—
everything is state-of-the-art. “They care about athletics,”
Johnson said.
At Palisades High, that same level of support for
facilities and equipment doesn’t exist. This is the first
year the girls have had a locker room, but as Johnson
points out, “We won a championship without it.”
Mater Dei defeated Pali, 99-73, after taking a 32-12
first-quarter lead. Although PaliHi outscored the
Monarchs in the second and third quarter, in the fourth
quarter Mater Dei came back with a vengeance.
“We worked very hard and although the score will tell
a story of us losing, we played hard and put ourselves in
a very good position throughout the game,” Johnson
said afterwards.
The Dolphin scoring was led by junior K. Merrill-Gillett
(23 points), senior Bianca King (21) and sophomore
Chelsey Gipson (16).
Johnson also praised players that don’t always get press,
such as, “Chaniya Pickett has to guard the opposing
team’s best ball handler, and Sammy Spanier (Fr.) Rita
Herbstman (Sr.), Julia Ide (So.), Hannah Akahoshi (Jr.)
and Arianna Haghani (Sr.) because they always work
hard in practice, helping us to get good.”
Pali does have a major advantage that many other
programs lack: Coach Johnson, but he gives all the credit
back to the girls. “We have a really great group of girls
who are creating their own destiny. They’re champs.”
He works with his players year-round. “The kids are
dedicated student-athletes who sacrifice weekends,”
Johnson said, noting that the girls who are on varsity
or trying to make the team practice Monday through
Saturday.
In addition to drills, the girls do weight training,
conditioning and skill building. “We partnered with
the football team and did the Navy Seals training with
them,” said Johnson, who is also strict about girls keeping
their grades high. His players are routinely recruited:
Dominique Scott went to USC, Nicole Flyer to the
University of Michigan and Molly Ross to Carleton.
“Study hall is mandatory during lunch and at seventh
period (2:27 to 3:08 p.m.) and sometimes they stay
until 4 p.m.,” Johnson said. This means some players
have to miss practice time to make sure their grades
are kept high.
His team doesn’t go unnoticed on campus. “This is
one of the best climates of one of the best programs at
the school,” said journalism teacher and former
sportswriter Lisa Saxon. “The girls support each other,
they know how to bring the best of each other on and
off the court.”