Pinewood’s deep roots
How coach built girls program into lasting power
LOS ALTOS HILLS >> Long before Pinewood’s triple-overtime classic — the cheers and tears of beating Archbishop Mitty for a spot in this weekend’s Open Division girls state championship game — there was a ball and a hoop, a coach and his daughter.
Doc Scheppler’s teams at Pinewood have always been known for shooting 3-pointers, a tool he learned not from the modern-day Warriors but while studying Rick Pitino’s Providence College team that reached the 1987 men’s Final Four.
Scheppler loved 3-point shooting so much that he taught it to his daughter, Kacey, who made a thenstate record 395 before graduating from Pinewood 20 years ago.
“We were in fourth and fifth grade and shooting threes,” Kacey recalled this week. “Granted, I don’t think any of them went in, but we were doing it.”
Decades later, Scheppler’s team is still shooting the three and so much more.
One week after stunning then-national No. 1 Mitty in one of the region’s all-time great games, Pinewood will play Windward-Los Angeles on Saturday night at Golden 1 Center in Sacramento for the state’s top prize.
It’s the mountaintop for a coach and a program that has celebrated six smallschool state championships and maintained a high level of success for nearly a quarter century. The steadiness has led to this moment:
Pinewood’s first appearance in a state Open final, the best-of-the-best division created in 2013.
“The game obviously is so important,” Scheppler said. “But we want them to relish the week, the day before, the day of as something that we’ll never forget because they deserve it.”
The stars of today’s team — Hannah Jump, Brianna Claros, Klara Astrom — follow the same tried and true formula that Scheppler brought to Pinewood when he accepted friend Peter Diepenbrock’s offer to coach the school’s eighth-grade girls team 24 seasons ago.
Lauren Smith-Hams, the star of the eighth-grade team, would go on to team with Kacey on varsity for three years, capping her high school career in 1999 with a record-setting shooting performance (seven 3-pointers, 31 points) as Pinewood won its first state championship.
Now known as Lauren Dressler — married, mother of three, runs her
own commercial real estate company — she plans to attend Saturday’s game with her family, cheering on a coach she called “brilliant” and her alma mater.
“I don’t think it’s surprising that he has maintained it over 20 years,” Dressler said. “As a player, that’s everything you want. It’s exciting to go to practice every day. It’s going to be fun. It’s Doc, and he’s hilarious.”
Kacey started her high school career at Sacred Heart Prep in Atherton, winning a Division I state championship as a freshman in 1995, then moved to Pinewood when her dad went from coaching the eighth grade to varsity. Now in his 23rd season, Scheppler’s record is 624-127.
“He makes you want to get better because winning is fun,” said Kacey, now married, the mother of two and a cardiac nurse. “There are fun competitions in practice. It’s not just roll the ball out, do 100 free throws, run through a couple of plays. He makes
it engaging. You only know that when you go play for other people.”
The epic victory over Mitty before a chargedup crowd at Santa Clara’s Leavey Center kept Scheppler up through the night and brought tears to his eyes as he recalled how many old friends and coaches attended the game. Kacey was there with the family — mom, 5-year-old daughter, brother and his 4-year-old son.
“I’ve never played in a game that crazy,” she said. “Packed house, triple overtime and you’re playing against the No. 1 team. It was insane.”
When Saturday’s game ended, Scheppler noted his team’s conditioning and ability to hit big shots in the tensest moments late in the game.
Pinewood averages 9.8 baskets from 3-point range per game for 283 on the season, both tops in the state. Against Mitty, Pinewood sank 11 from beyond the arc, including six by Jump.