Dominican's Te Manu Whakataki “Taki” Te Koi rebounds from devastating knee injury

By David Albee, Dominican Sports Information

SAN RAFAEL, CA - The loose ball was rolling away from Te Manu Whakataki “Taki” Te Koi and she did all she could to retrieve it.

Her team had rallied from a 13-point second-half deficit against Hawai‘i Hilo to take a one-point lead in the Conlan Center with under three minutes remaining. Te Koi, then a junior guard for the Dominican University of California women’s basketball team, wasn’t going to let the momentum - or the ball - get away. She went all-out, diving ferociously and courageously to the floor, determined to prevent the ball from going out of bounds.

She leaped and lunged. Her anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee tore.

To gain one key possession, Te Koi had sacrificed the rest of her season. The play officially went into the box score as a steal last January 27 but the play was much more significant to Te Koi, her teammates and coaches. It epitomized the style of play the Penguins are bringing to the basketball court and the nature of the student-athletes they recruit.

Te Koi may have left the gymnasium that night on crutches, destined for surgery, but she had gained so much admiration and appreciation for her effort in a play that, like the basketball she was chasing, was not lost in a 61-56 victory.

 “We won the game. It might have been a different result if I didn’t go and get it,” Te Koi said. “I wish I had not gotten hurt, but do I regret getting the ball? No.”

It is that spirit of competition that has carried over to Dominican’s 2011-12 season. Te Koi is healthy again and her team is looking good, too.

Te Koi has been named a team tri-captain, along with junior guard Kimi Nakamura and slimmed-down junior forward Melissa Wise who, Te Koi said, “looks much stronger and so prepared for this season.”

Wise is the leading scorer and rebounder returning from last year’s team. With her and veteran players such as Stephanie Carnes, Mary Kate Jankowski and Kayla Valentine back, the additions of 6-foot-2 redshirt freshman Lauren Hyatt (who tore an ACL last season) and Natalie Bentz and incoming top recruits 6-4 Sarah Nelson, Jasmine Green, Arianna Flynn and Danielle Yamauchi, the Lady Penguins, according to Te Koi, have a mesh of talent and “bubbly personalities” that’s created great team chemistry so far.

“This time of year is always filled with a lot of emotions.  Excitement for the talent and possibilities for the season. Anxiety for the unknown about how the team will perform,” said Penguins coach Brianna Chambers. “We are young, with only six of our 13 players having played with us last year. So we are going to go through growing pains, as players get more experience, but we are excited to learn together and continue to build on last year.”

Chambers is building a new coaching staff as well. It includes top assistant Toni West who, in Te Koi’s eyes, has been an immediate impact.

“She just has such a presence,” Te Koi said. “It’s a perfect balance. They really complement each other.”

Now the trick is combine coaching and competition into a team that can meet the challenges of a schedule that includes games in Alaska, Hawai‘i, Arizona and Utah and a seven-game homestand that will feature a Dec. 29 contest with Division I Brown University from the Ivy League.

The caliber of opponents is quite a change from Te Koi’s freshman year when she was Freshman of the Year in the NAIA California Pacific Conference. She came to Dominican from her native New Zealand after scouting the campus while on a basketball road trip with her high school teammates in Marin County.

At Dominican as a freshman, Te Koi started 20 games and averaged six points game, 7.75 pgg in Cal Pac play. She had a career-high 17 points versus Pacific Union. She was well on her way toward her goal of playing for New Zealand in the 2012 Summer Olympiad in London.

“You had that momentum already and that first year under your belt and you think from here on it can only get better,” Te Koi said. “Unfortunately it hasn’t been that way for me. What do they call it here? The sophomore jinx? That kind of applies to me.”

Te Koi’s playing time diminished the next two seasons, but her contribution to the team grew in stature. It isn’t measured so much in points and assists as it is in effort, commitment and attitude.

"She has worked extremely hard to get back to make her senior year special,” Chambers said. “Taki hasn't been fully cleared yet, so on the drills that she can't participate in, you see Taki on the sideline mimicking everything the players on the court are doing.  So when she is cleared, she can step right in and not miss a beat. That is what makes Taki extraordinary.”

That was evident when she sprawled across the court belly-first last January 27 going after a loose ball that she believed could make a difference to her teammates and coaches if she grabbed it.

“That’s exactly why I went for the ball. It was a tight game in a crucial moment,” Te Koi said. “You make the most of every opportunity. I could have let it go. It would have been their ball, but…”

But that’s not the way she operates. She involves herself in the game or whatever she does. The bottom line is that inspirational play helped produce a win for the Penguins, even if it cost Te Koi playing time in the final nine games of the season.

“It was frustrating not being able to play but the thing that I focused on was still being there for my teammates and having a presence off the court and doing all the little things to help encourage my teammates,” Te Koi said. “I reminded myself why I am here.”

Te Koi came to Dominican with a purpose. She is a biological sciences major who last season was named to the PacWest All-Academic team. She is vice president of the Penguins Student Athlete Advisory Committee and Resident Advisor Representative at the University. She realizes this is her last go-round, her last hurrah if you will, at Dominican, and she wants to make everyone proud.

 “I’m representing my family and my country,” Te Koi said. “It’s my senior year and I want to fight to finish what I started.”

She is going to go all-out trying.