Benefield: Rancho Cotate girls basketball team ready to break out

Confidence. Mario Newton must have reiterated the concept of confidence - a coach in his program, an athlete in her shot, a player in herself - 20 times in our conversation.

And he added this: Confidence takes time.

Newton is entering his fourth season at the helm of the Rancho Cotate girls’ basketball program and he’s ready to say it out loud: This team is ready to break out.

“Last year I felt, as a coach, we probably weren’t playoff hopefuls,” he said. “But this year? I think we could potentially make it.”

Despite his rising confidence, there is still a sliver of guardedness to his words. After all, Rancho Cotate went 10-16 last year and 2-12 in the North Bay League. The year before that the Cougars were 7-17 and 1-13 in league. That one NBL win marked the end of a three-year drought.

“I knew it would take that long,” Newton said. “When I took the job at Rancho, it wasn’t to win basketball games. I was trying to bring the fun back into the game. I was trying to get more girls to come out for basketball.”

Two years ago, Newton had at his disposal an eight-player roster with only three returning varsity players. This season 50 girls tried out for the varsity, junior varsity and freshmen teams.

“Before we had half that and we had to go find girls for the freshman team,” he said.

The varsity squad, which plays Liberty High in the Wine Valley Tournament at Napa High School tonight, is off to a 5-1 start. The JV team is 6-0.

“I’m really confident about this year,” said senior captain Reilani Peleti. “I feel like we are really prepared.”

Peleti, a four-year member of the varsity squad who has played for Newton his entire tenure, has better perspective than most.

She’s been on the teams that scrapped for few wins, the teams that came up short. It feels different this year.

“We are quicker this year; we are bigger; we have a bench,” she said. “Everyone showed up over summer ball. Some girls have made big transformations in confidence, really. You can definitely see it on the court.”

There’s that confidence again.

And the bench. After getting into early foul trouble, the Cougars had to go to the bench early Tuesday night in their?88-75 home win against Kennedy High of Richmond. That was a luxury Newton felt he didn’t have last season.

“We needed our whole team to win that game,” Newton said.

It wouldn’t have happened 12 months ago.

“Last year, literally, I was only confident in about six or seven players, but now I have confidence in pretty much all of them,” he said.

That may be a function of Newton’s roster of four seniors, four juniors, four sophomores and one freshmen. All are varsity returners, barring two.

And no two are more important that Peleti, who Newton calls “a stud athlete,” and fellow captain, junior Camille Spackman.

Peleti, a multi-sport standout who is headed to Chico State next year to play softball, is averaging 13 points and a team high of nearly eight rebounds a game.

She’s tied with senior point guard Julia Guerrero for the most steals per game with nearly four.

Spackman is the Cougars’ leading scorer with almost 18 points per game. She tossed in 30 Tuesday night. She also grabs six rebounds per game.

“She’s the most offensively aggressive player that I have,” Newton said. “She doesn’t get open just to get open; she gets open to score.”

Make no mistake, the Cougars have their work cut out for them if they want to continue on their upward arc of getting more wins each year under Newton’s tutelage.

Contenders in the North Bay League really start with a goal of coming in second. After all, who is going to topple a reigning state champion Cardinal Newman squad that returns all five starters?

My word, talk about the confidence that must emanate from the gym on Old Redwood Highway.

But beyond the Cardinals, the league is thick with teams that present problems for each other.

Newton likes the looks of Windsor, Montgomery and Santa Rosa, although their superstar Emily Codding has been sidelined and the Panthers are an out-of-character 1-4 early on.

Casa Grande is incredibly young, with just one senior on the roster, but was 4-1 heading into Wednesday night’s contest with Middletown.

“The NBL is still a very competitive league,” Newton said. “I couldn’t even guess what’s going to happen. We just know that the powerhouse is Cardinal Newman and everything from there, we’ll see what happens.”

Whatever happens, the Cougars are gaining self-assurance.

“They believe they can do something,” Newton said.

And in the confidence game, believing is half the battle.

You can reach staff columnist Kerry Benefield at 707-526-8671 or kerry.benefield@pressdemocrat.com, on Twitter @benefield and on Instagram at kerry.benefield. Podcasting on iTunes “Overtime with Kerry Benefield.”