EL SEGUNDO HERALD December 8, 2016 Page 5 Eagles Soccer Preview Business credit lines. Cash management services. Commercial RE, construction and equipment loans. Ed Myska Senior Vice President 310.321.3285 emyska@grandpointbank.com 1960 E. Grand Avenue, Suite 1200 El Segundo, CA 90245 grandpointbank.com Five-Star Superior Rating by Bauer Financial By Gregg McMullin The El Segundo high school soccer programs have been on the rise for years. The boys’ team reached the CIF Southern Section quarterfinals in consecutive years the past two seasons. The girls’ team has had a winning record in nine out of the past 10 seasons. Both teams have one thing in common going into this season--a shortage of experience. Both have plenty of undiscovered talent. It should bode well for these teams that continue to show the South Bay and the Ocean League that they are among the better squads around. Head coach Andrew Kelly has helped build a strong Eagle squad, especially the past few years. Two seasons ago, he guided the Eagles to an impressive 18-3-3 record and last season the Eagles won their first Ocean League title. Each time they advanced to the playoffs, reaching a school-best quarterfinal round. This season, the Eagles could be going through growing pains. The team lost 11 players to graduation, but they do return nine impressive and talented players. Tyler Villalobos and Daniel Gutierrez are the only returning players. According to Coach Kelly, a number of underclassmen who played significant roles last season will be counted on for their experience. Junior forward Chase Ryan has the skill to pick apart opposing defenses and has a keen sense of where his teammates are and where the best shot on goal is. Though the El Segundo offense should run through Ryan, others such as Malcolm Holtzmann-Cisse, Abraham Hernandez and Villalobos should give the Eagles enough options to score. Eyeing El Segundo Inline Hockey’s Top Prize Story and Photos by Gregg McMullin There is a sport in El Segundo that has gone greatly unnoticed in the shadow of excellent baseball, softball, football and soccer programs. Many people are very aware of its sibling sport by the two-time Stanley Cup champion Los Angeles Kings (El Segundo-based by the way) on ice. Yet what about the wheeled game that for over the past 30-plus years has been an underground pick-up sport in various parking lots to a former high school club--and has now grown into an organized and rapidly growing community recreational sport playing at Rec Park’s Roller Hockey Rink of Sheldon? In 1994, members of the community came together to create the El Segundo Inline Hockey Association (ESIHA). Through this youth program covering kids ages 3-17, volunteer parents coach and teach kids how to skate and play the amazing sport of hockey. For a fraction of the investment of the ice counterparts, ESIHA has provided an economical and easy way for both parents and kids to experience this exciting game. It often provides a launching pad for many players to expand onto ice or to lifelong love affairs with the sport of hockey. After 22 years since achieving the charter of the organization, ESIHA is extremely excited to announce the first El Segundo Cup. Yes, it does highly resemble the ultimate trophy in all of sports (Lord Stanley’s Cup), but for the El Segundo hockey family it represents a new stage--one of growth and achievement. As the league continues to grow and the popularity expands, organizers want to reward those teams that achieve the ultimate goal of winning the ESIHA championships. At every level in the league, parents and coaches watch as kids quickly develop skills from day one of practice to that final match-up in playoffs or championships. While there are rewards for those that come up a bit short, teams that win it all will get to not only take a picture with the El Segundo Cup--but also have their team names engraved on it. The El Segundo Cup will live on for generations and the hopes is that the skills and excitement taught in this league will one day lead to an alumnus from the ESIHA hoisting the actual Lord Stanley’s Cup. Championship Saturday is set for February 4 for first presentations of the El Segundo Cup to the winning teams. • For Clippers, It’s Do or Die By Adam Serrao The Clippers have been the best team in Los Angeles for the better part of a decade now. It’s certainly no easy task unseating the traditionally mighty and powerful Lakers. Being kings of the Staples Center is something that carries with it a lot of weight. That weight is something that head coach Doc Rivers and stars of the team Chris Paul, Blake Griffin, and DeAndre Jordan have had to carry on their backs. The team has had bragging rights over the Lakers for what seems to be an eternity now. With a slowly emerging Purple and Gold squad and a quickly aging Clippers roster, it has now become do or die for a team that has seemingly always taken a backseat in L.A. When Chris Paul joined the Los Angeles Clippers five years ago, everyone thought that the team was destined for greatness. A trade that was denied by the NBA that could have sent Paul to the Lakers wound up with the All-Star point guard setting up home on the other side of the Staples Center. Paul certainly set a tone of winning in the locker room. The Clippers have made the playoffs every year since his arrival. Despite the team’s relative success, they have always fallen a bit short of expectations and have still failed to make it past the second round of the playoffs. When teams continuously fall short, things never end well. Either a marquee player gets shipped out or the coach has to go because his message simply isn’t being received any longer. Rivers hasn’t exactly lost the locker room yet, but the guys on the team haven’t necessarily gotten along with each other in the recent past either. With free agency coming up this offseason, the Clippers could face the loss of many of their key pieces to the club. “When you have multiple alphas, multiple guys in a lot of TV commercials, there is always going to be some tension and clashing,” Clipper guard J.J. Redick told ESPN.com. “We won 17 straight in [2012-13],” Chris Paul said, “but the spirit wasn’t right.” Griffin then chimed in saying, “We had rifts.” He later followed that up by explaining, “I never had a problem with Chris,” meaning that he, and probably many more teammates, have obviously had their share of problems with Paul in the past. All of those problems that are currently trying to be swept under the rug, combined with a team that is continuously falling short of expectations, can lead an owner to lean towards shaking up the roster in a major way. Paul, Griffin, and Redick all enter the free agent market this summer, assuming that the first two exercise the options built into their respective contracts. Judging the league by how players now have the propensity to team up in order to win a championship the easy way, it’s simple to see how both Paul and Griffin will certainly go their separate ways in the offseason, even if the team should be fortunate enough to win a championship. Winning a championship isn’t an easy thing to do, though, especially against teams like the Golden State Warriors and the Cleveland Cavaliers. That being said, the Clippers best--and perhaps last--shot at winning a title is here and now in the 2016- 17 NBA season. When the season began, it looked as if the shot the Clippers had to win that championship had a great chance to come to fruition. A team that had its season ended early in the playoffs once again last year came out strong to start the year, going 10-1 through the first 11 games. The Clippers wound up going 14-2 for one of the best records in the league. Then, the downfall came. A threegame losing streak to the Detroit Pistons, Indiana Pacers and Brooklyn Nets put the team back behind the San Antonio Spurs and the Warriors in the standings. L.A. responded with a nice win over the reigning champions, the Cleveland Cavaliers, but now people’s ears have been raised, waiting to see how the rest of the season might possibly play out. Twenty-five games is obviously too little a time to judge a team, but when taking away the microscope that focuses solely on this season and this season alone, it’s clear to see that the time that this team has left is minimal at best. Not only will the Clippers have to navigate through a Warriors team that has now been bolstered by the acquisition of Kevin Durant, but they’ll also still have to find a way to get past the likes of Greg Popovich and the Spurs. Should they do that, LeBron and the Cavs will be waiting. If Doc Rivers and the Clippers don’t win it all this year, they’ll have to deal with the departure of key players from their roster and a young, up-and-coming Lakers team that has traditionally owned Los Angeles and is only getting better and even more exciting to watch. This is the year that the Clippers must prove themselves. This is the year for Rivers and the rest of his club to realize that it’s do or die. – Asixlion@earthlink.net The winning teams of the various inline hockey divisions will be displayed on the El Segundo Cup. See Eagles, page 8
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