Cal State Dominguez Hills women’s basketball celebrates historic run to Elite Eight

There was no epiphany. The realization that this group of women was playing basketball at a level never seen before at a school in the shadow of USC and UCLA came gradually, one victory after another.

By the time Cal State Dominguez Hills was 19-0, it was abundantly clear that unprecedented accomplishments were ahead, that the potential for something unimaginable in any other year was within their grasp.

The Bulls (31-2) will travel to Missouri to prepare to play Catawba (28-5), a university in Salisbury, NC, in the NCAA Division II Elite Eight beginning Monday. They already won the Western Region championship for the first time while hosting the tournament for the first time. They also won the California Collegiate Athletic Association. qualification.

And they rose to No. 4 in the national ratings, rarefied air for a show that had been ranked just once before at No. 18 in 1984-85.

“For it to be so special, I wasn’t sure for a while,” Dominguez Hills coach John Bonner said. “In November, even into December, as we finished our preseason opponents, it started to become clear that this was a different team, the way we were winning and our chemistry.

“We recognized that something good is about to happen this year. But we couldn’t predict it would be that good.”

On-court excellence has always been secondary to the family atmosphere and camaraderie that Bonner has fostered since taking the reins ahead of the 2016-17 season. His first team went 7-20, and it wasn’t until he went 13-12 last season that the Bulls were on the sunny side of .500.

“What people don’t see all the time is that we are so much more than athletes,” said Bonner, who has a master’s degree in family counseling and therapy. “The team is connected, they spend a lot of time together. We talk about social justice issues, women’s issues. We understand how smart and cerebral they are and how much they want to make a difference when basketball is over.”

Primary leadership is provided by guard Dawnyel Lair, the CCAA player of the year who began her career at Wichita State and went to community college in New Mexico before transferring to Dominguez Hills before her junior year.

Most of his Toros teammates are sophomores and freshmen, which bodes well for continued success this season.

“It’s a role I inherited, I didn’t really look for it,” said Lair, who won the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association. First-team All-American honors. “We have a fairly young group and it turns out that they want to hear from me. I just take it as a challenge. I’m the oldest of my siblings, so I’m used to people looking up to me. The team is like a family. I’m like a big sister to everyone in a way.”

During preseason, Bonner handed out dog tags to each player and asked them to present one to a teammate they find inspiring. Lair finished with a large handful.

Cal State Dominguez Hills coach John Bonner holds up a net after his team cut it down March 13 in Carson. The Bulls celebrated advancing to the Elite Eight for the first time in school history.

(Jena Rouser/Cal State Dominguez Hills)

“She’s a bit quiet and her teammates wanted her to speak up,” Bonner said. “She is super humble. When we pick teams for squad skirmishes, she picks teammates who don’t get a lot of minutes. She is a first person in a team”.

Lair, who attended Fairfax High, is averaging 13.9 points, leading a balanced offense that also gets 13 points per game from Lakewood High sophomore Asia Jordan and Long Beach Poly freshman Nala Williams. Jordan was MVP of the West Regional.

“Our mantra is interrupt, defend and recover,” Bonner said. “We will use a variety of pressures depending on our opponent. We try to get people out of their flow and make them play in a different way.”

The Bulls have gotten away with almost every opponent thus far. What do they know about the Catawba? They’re not sure it matters.

“Every game will come down to us policing our identity,” Lair said. “We want to understand what they do, but the main thing is to keep doing what we’ve been doing all season.”