For the first time ever, the California Lutheran University Kingsmen and Regals basketball teams both finished as regular season Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference champions in the same year.
On Saturday, Feb. 17, the Kingsmen and Regals basketball teams ended their regular season with wins as they celebrated senior day in Gilbert Arena at 2 p.m. and 4 p.m.
The Regals celebrated senior small forward Grace Godines and senior center Aliya DiMuro.
“It’s just so special, and I feel like this team, we’re especially close, and we just have worked so hard and we feel like we deserve to be here,” Aliya DiMuro said.
Aliya DiMuro said the game was a great experience, and although her nerves were high nearing the end, she knew the Regals were going to win.
“I can’t even put it into words, it’s just been a great night, it’s so special…I feel like when we’re gonna win we just have that look in our eye and we just know that it’s gonna happen,” Aliya DiMuro said.
Head Women’s Basketball Coach Kelli DiMuro said winning SCIAC had been a dream of hers that she and her team have been working towards for years.
“We were ready for anything, and we promised them that we would get the dream of winning SCIAC,” Kelli DiMuro said.
The team, Kelli DiMuro said, works on both chemistry and family as a close-knit group. She said their success didn’t just come from the few girls who get to see the court every game. The others, Kelli DiMuro said, practice very hard to get better every day.
“They may not get in the game, but they practice hard with us, really push us to the limit, and that’s why we’re successful, because of those girls,” Kelli DiMuro said.
Assistant Women’s Basketball Coach Melissa Sanchez said she doesn’t want her team to settle for what they have and wants them to continue to stay focused and locked in as they move forward.
“We’ve got first place, but we haven’t done anything yet… We want, ultimately, to win the tournament, we want to go to NCAAs, so we have to stay focused,” Sanchez said. “One game, one practice at a time, and continue to push each other.”
Kingsmen basketball also celebrated it’s seniors: Devon Lewis, Riley O’Connor, Patrick Renane, Tommy Griffitts, Lojong Andarea Ladu, and senior broadcaster Logan Soforenko. Although not a player on the team, Soforenko has been the men’s basketball play-by-play broadcaster for all four years he has been at Cal Lutheran. Senior point guard Stephen Davis did not celebrate senior day due to his commitment to return to Kingsmen basketball next season for a fifth year.
“I’m definitely looking forward to next year. Hopefully, we can have the same result,” Davis said.
Davis is happy with the support that his team has received from his peers and others at Cal Lutheran.
“We haven’t lost a home game this year, and that’s a credit to all of the fans and everybody showing support,” Davis said.
Head Men’s Basketball Coach Russell White also said he felt support from the school, and that in all his time at Cal Lutheran, he has never seen a full crowd in the gym.
“That’s a personal goal of mine: have a full gym for a basketball game. I’ve never seen it before,” White said.
White said that his team is always focusing on finding ways to get better, no matter what the results or records that come throughout the season may be.
“If you focus on the process and not the results, the results don’t matter… If you’re happy with the work you put in… sometimes winning is out of your hands, but what’s not out of your hands is how you prepare, how you approach, how hard you play, how well you play together,” White said.
White said that each individual player has shown immense growth and that they build off of every game.
“We’re just a little bit better, we’re just a little bit older, we’re a little bit smarter,” White said.
Assistant Men’s Basketball Coach Kyle Milligan also credited his team’s success to each player’s individual growth year-by-year.
“A lot of learning experiences happened last year, with a team that was a little bit younger and now it kind of feels like we’ve been there, we’ve done this,” Milligan said.
Milligan said that the team is a “player-led team,” and starts with their senior leaders. He said they take on a lot of accountability regarding themselves and how they develop which has molded the team together.
“If this one guy’s not locked in, we just go to the next guy and we don’t miss a beat,” Milligan said. “So there is almost some inner competition of ‘Hey if I’m not locked in and I don’t concentrate on the right things, I’m not gonna play today.'”
He said that this is one of the most balanced teams he has ever been a part of, and individually, no one on the team is top ten in rebounds or scoring in the league. Milligan said this accentuates the team’s teamwork and balance.
With this senior day win, the Kingsmen continue to grow their program record, obtaining their 18th consecutive win, according to CLUSports. Both the Kingsmen and the Regals remain undefeated at home this season, and both teams hope to keep that going.
The Regals will take on the Redlands Bulldogs at home for the women’s semifinal SCIAC game on Thursday, Feb. 22 at 7 p.m., and the Kingsmen will take on the Chapman Panthers at home for the men’s semifinal SCIAC game on Friday, Feb. 23 at 7 p.m.
