Bye-bye, coach!

By Kevin Wong

oaching is a very challenging

job. In any sport the coach is

usually the first person to get
fired when his team does not perform
well.. Recently, two soccer managers,
Tony Adams, and Luiz Felipe Scolari
were axed by their respective English
Premier League teams, Portsmouth and
Chelsea.

Adams was one of the best

defensemen for Arsenal and team
England in the 1990s and being a

soccer coach was probably a dream
for Adams after his retirement. He
had been the assistant manager for
Portsmouth’s last few seasons but on
October 25", 2008, Adams replaced
Harry Redknapp to manage the team.
From that point on the team’s results in
the league were extremely poor. Their
record was 2W-9L-4D. Which begs the
question: is Adams coaching material
or not? Well, the statistics don’t lie and
hopefully Portsmouth will play better
with their new manager.

So then, who would expect that

Luiz Felipe Scolari to be fired by
Chelsea after two thirds of the season?
Surprising, isn’t it? Scolari is one of
the most famous soccer coaches in the
world and has helped Brazil to win a
World Cup, has coached Portugal in
the World Cup as well as the European
Championship. However, Chelsea

isn’t turning out to be that mighty this
season. They are ranked in fourth place
on the table with four losses being
courtesy of the traditional “Big Three,”
Manchester United, Liverpool and
Arsenal.

 

 

If you were the team owner or the
chairman of Chelsea, what would you
do to improve your club? Is firing the
coach the best solution? In this case it
seems so since Chelsea is now managed
by Guus Hiddink, the head coach of
team Russia. His fruitful coaching
experience has helped South Korea to
advance into the semi-final in the World
Cup 2002 and helped Russia to advance
into the semi-final in the Euro 2008 last
summer. With any luck, Chelsea will
improve now that Hiddink is in charge
of the team.

 

Douglas on

 

Royals forward Jawauwn States

 

course to make the playoffs

By Tristan Noble

two-game weekend series in
men’s basketball split between
e Columbia Bible College

Bearcats left the Douglas College
Royals tied with the University of
Capilano Blues for fifth place in the
BCCAA standings. The first game, on
Friday, February 6", saw an impressive
Royals team cruise to an 81-63 victory
over the Bearcats. The second game
saw an improved and determined
Bearcats side walk away with a 79-73
win.

With no returning players and
a new head coach in Gil Cheung,
it has been hard to aspire to the
heights reached by Douglas’ national
championship-winning side of last
season. Razzle-dazzle players like
Andrew Sturgeon, Bol Kong and Billy
MeNutt are greatly missed but a couple
new faces have stepped in to fill the
void. Forward Jawauwn States and
guard Drew Slaught have performed
admirably at the helm of Douglas’
offense. States is the current BCCAA
leader in points per game with 22.9 and

the rebounds leader with 12.9 rebounds
per game. Slaught holds down fourth
place in BCCAA men’s scoring with
18.8 points per game.

Head Coach Gil Cheung comes
to Douglas with a wealth of coaching
and playing knowledge and experience.
Cheung won the B.C. high school
basketball championship with the
Richmond Colts in 1998 and then went
on to help lead Langara to the 1999
CCAA national title. Cheung was then
selected to be team captain at Brandon
University, where he backed Brandon
to four.conference championships and
two silver medals at the CIS national

championships between 2000 and 2004.

Cheung was also the assistant coach
at SFU for the past two seasons. In the
grand scheme of things, Douglas has
chosen a really fantastic replacement
for the departed head coach of three
seasons, Jamie Oei.

The Royals have harnessed their
speed in the transitional game and
have generated a great many scoring
chances from quick breakout passes
that often catch the defending team flat
footed. They have also tapped into their

 

accuracy from beyond the arch to great
effect. Both these facets of Douglas’
game were evident in the Friday victory
over CBC.

With just two games left on the
regular season schedule, Douglas will
look to clinch one of the final two
playoff berths. Douglas’ post season
hopes will likely boil down to the
final two games of the season against
ninth-place Camosun College and first
place Vancouver Island University. The
Royals will also have to keep a close
eye on the scoreboard with CBC and
Kwantlen in close pursuit of the final
playoff spot. That said, with a little help
from other teams Douglas could ease
into the coming post season; however,
their fate is still truly in their own
hands.

MV FTH MER ey em eT MLM MPO TEMY Rom
Douglas will need all the fan support it can

get. If students or Faculty cannot make it to
Douglas’ New Westminster campus for the

final games of the season, they can watch at
home via the live w ists on the BCCAA

website at www.bccaa.ca.

15