Orange County Community College Notebook / Steve Kresal : Rancho Santiago Off Quickly, but Coach Puts on the Brakes

You can’t blame Dana Pagett, Rancho Santiago basketball coach, for downplaying the Dons’ impressive start.

The Dons (18-3) have won the Tip-Off Tournament at Rancho Santiago, the Cypress Thoroughbred Tournament and the Rancho Santiago Holiday Tournament.

After Rancho Santiago beat Orange Empire Conference rival Cypress, 93-75, to win the Cypress Tournament on Dec. 20, Pagett was quick to remind reporters that it was nothing more than a nonconference game.

“I though we played very well,” he said. “It was a nice win but it was not in conference.”

On Dec. 28, the Dons defeated another Orange Empire team, Saddleback, 65-64, to win their own tournament and stop Saddleback’s 10-game winning streak.

But Pagett had much the same comment afterward.

“We did the things it takes to win,” he said. “But we still have to play them (Saddleback) twice more in conference and once at their place.”

You can’t blame Pagett for being skeptical. He has seen this kind of start before.

Last season, the Dons won 13 of their first 16, including their South Coast Conference opener. But they lost 12 of 15 conference games to finish 16-15.

Last season, Rancho Santiago’s offense was based on the inside play of Mark Mosses, who averaged 20.8 points a game.

This season, Rancho Santiago--averaging about 95 points per game--has four starters and one player off the bench averaging 11 points or more.

Sophomore guard Chris Jefferson leads the team with an 18.2 average.

The return of Orange Empire Conference basketball action Wednesday were the first games since the conference disbanded following the 1947-48 season.

Original conference members were Chaffey, Citrus, Fullerton, Santa Ana (now Rancho Santiago), Riverside, Mt. San Antonio and San Bernardino Valley.

The 1986 version: Saddleback, Rancho Santiago, Cypress, Citrus, Riverside and Orange Coast.

Ed (Pop) Mulder of Huntington Beach, a volunteer coach for the Golden West soccer team in the late 1960s and early ‘70s, died Monday of natural causes. He was 88.

In 1985, the soccer and softball complex at Golden West was named after Mulder.

A $200 scholarship in Mulder’s name is given to a softball team member each season.

Sheila Conover, a student at Orange Coast and a member of the 1984 Olympic team, was voted female kayaking Athlete of the Year by the U.S. Olympic Committee.

She won the individual kayaking 5,000-meter race and the 500-meter one-, two- and four-person events at the Pan American Games in Oak Ridge, Tenn., last June.

She finished sixth in the individual and fourth in the four-person kayaking competition during the 1984 Olympics on Lake Casitas.

Conover also coaches the freshman and sophomore girls’ volleyball teams at Newport Harbor High School.