LACES understands and accepts its struggles

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What on earth did LACES do to deserve this fate? A team with no player taller than 6-foot-1 has to compete in the Western League where three of the City’s best teams -- Fairfax, Westchester and Palisades-- reside.

The trick to maintaining sanity, Coach Ernest Baskerville said, is expecting to play plenty of games against teams with more talent. And not wallow in tough losses, like the 89-70 defeat Hawthorne hung on the 7-8 Unicorns today at the Johnnie Cochran Classic at Cal State Dominguez Hills.

‘When you can teach players winning, they’ll have a winning attitude,’ said Baskerville, who was the late Cochran’s assistant for seven years and still works at the law firm that bears his name.

‘We’re not out there just trying to survive. We believe we can win. You don’t teach them they can win, they’re not going to ... by the time we get to the Small School (Division) playoffs, we’ll be ready.’

-- Mike Terry