Pierce College Athletic Hall of Fame induction ceremony A special night for an elite group

FELIPE GAMINO Sports Editor fgamino.roundupnews@gmail.com

Top tier athletes and coaches will be the amongst the celebrated at the Pierce College Athletic Hall of Fame Ceremony on May 26 at the Woodland Hills Country Club.

The 12 sportsmen and women being inducted this year have proved their worth,on and off the field.

Athletic Director Robert Lofrano explains how the ceremony is coming together.

“This is our fourth one, so the preparations are coming along very smoothly cause we done it before,” Lofrano said. “We look into a little committee. We look at who coached and who played. It’s an impressive group.”

Lofrano coached baseball for 35 years in which 18 of them were at Pierce. He also played on the team from 1968 to 1969. He would end up winning the Western State Conference Coach of the

Year eight times. In 1988, he won Coach of the Year at California State High School.

Women’s volleyball coach

Nabil Mardini will be another of the inductees on the night. He is an eight-time Coach of the year, and in 2010 and 2012 he won the National Volleyball Coach of the Year. Mardini won three State titles, and 13 conference championships.

“I’m honored to be inducted,” Mardini said. “I’ve always felt that for someone to be inducted into the hall of fame you have to do a lot more than what I have accomplished or done personally if you ask me, but nonetheless I’m very grateful to Bob.”

Women’s soccer coach Adolfo Perez has been at Pierce for 15 seasons. He has won ten WSC Championships, and made playoffs for 15 straight years. He is also an eight-time Coach of the Year.

“I’m nervous and honored,” Perez said. It’s been a journey since 2001. Preparing for a speech is hard because you want to be perfect, but it’s hard when you’re in front of so many people.”

Perez had many accomplishments during his career as a player and now as a coach. However, being a hall of fame inductee tops the list.

“I’ve been blessed to have a lot of accomplishments individually and collectively in soccer,” Perez said. “I think by far this is the most important one.”

Out of all the inductees, Jim Wolf won’t be in attendance. He will be working as an umpire on that night. Wolf played baseball at Pierce from 1990 to 1991. He has been an umpire for 15 years, in which he has been involved in the 2010 All-Star Game, the 2011 League Championship and last year’s World Series.

The festivities kick off with a dinner at 6 p.m. followed by the awards ceremony at 7 p.m.

On a warm Tuesday afternoon, six pairs of colorful soccer cleats form a circle near The Pit waiting to begin their co-ed soccer class. Among the players is forward and captain Makayla Nichols, laughing and enjoying her time with returning teammates.

The 2016-17 women’s soccer season is a few months away, and the ladies are preparing body and mind to be in the best shape they can be before their first game of the fall. They have high expectations to bring in an 11th conference title as well as conquering the state playoffs.

According to Nichols, to accomplish their goals, the ladies must have a consistent mentality and work as a team to get farther in playoffs than last year.

“[The mentality of] always coming to practice and working hard and making sure you’re here,” Nichols said. “When you are here you are focusing on what the coach has to say and making sure you’re giving 100 percent at practice.”

In the 2015-16 season, the ladies ended with a record of 13-2-6, and competed in the Western State Conference for the 15th time in a

“We had a phenomenal season,” coach Adolfo Perez said. “We won conference for the tenth time. The team was remarkable and we led the state in less goals against. We only allowed seven goals all year.”

The team’s success was due to their defense and their ability to score goals as a team. Instead of relying on one key player the team scored collectively, according to Perez.

Even with their success on the field, returning players are directing their energy on improving mistakes from last season, as well as establishing and maintaining strong bonds with new players.

“Our weakness was our consistency,” Perez said. “There were some games that we looked like rock stars and other games we were flat.”

The Brahmas had other issues like not being physically prepared as they should have during last season.

“I think for us, as a team, we are going to focus on being more in shape because we had a problem with that last season, where in the summer training we didn’t do as much fitness as we should have,” Nichols said. “So it kind of reflected when we played.”

To change that, Nichols, along with her teammates, are working Monday through Friday for an hour with Nick Mosich, who is in charge of strength and conditioning for Pierce’s athletic teams.

Returning player, center-mid and criminology major, Tessa Koziol, says she needs to shoot more from far out, and have more confidence in herself and see where that confidence will take her.

Emotion is running high amongst the players. In the summer, the intense practices begin when the whole team is united.

“I’m excited because this is my second year,” Koziol said. “I have experience now in the college level.”

The women’s soccer team has proven multiple times that they are formidable. Out of 62 programs throughout the state of California, only 16 are able to participate in the state playoffs as well as the 10 conference titles under their belt.

“We’ve been blessed,” Perez said. “We’ve had so much success that we are everybody’s rival. Here at Pierce it is our expectation to win a state championship, at least to win conference. Other schools, it’s to beat Pierce.”