COC NOTEBOOK: WOMEN'S SOCCER HAPPY TO BE HOME.

Byline: Heather Gripp Staff Writer

SANTA CLARITA - Spending last week on the road made the College of the Canyons women's soccer team even more appreciative that more than half of its games in the second half of division play are at home.

The Cougars are used to spreading their offense on their spacious field, but they've had to adjust to much smaller fields for recent road games. Among the smallest was at Pierce, where COC won 2-0 last week.

Players noted another reason for wanting to play at home: Opponents are usually not as used to the warm weather and tend to tire more quickly.

The desire to keep playing at home helps motivate the Cougars even though they hold a comfortable lead in the Western State Conference South race. The two-time defending division champs want to be ranked in top four in Southern California - they are ranked No. 4 - so they can have home-field advantage during the postseason. Last year, they had to travel to San Diego for the second round, where they lost.

``We definitely want to be at home for playoffs,'' said sophomore defender Tessa Barnett. ``We can't let a big lead get to us. No matter what, we still want to go undefeated. We can't get too comfortable. We know we're in a good position. We control our own destiny.''

The Cougars play their final regular-season road game Tuesday at Bakersfield.

--Aiming for a perfect 10: The women's soccer team is trying to go undefeated in WSC South Division play for a second year in a row. But this year, the Cougars have to win additional games to do so. COC went 8-0 en route to last year's South title. This year's addition of Pierce added two more games to division play but not an end to COC's divisional dominance.

The Cougars finished the first round of South play undefeated after beating Glendale 2-1 on Friday. They improved to 6-0 in the South by defeating Santa Monica 2-0 on Tuesday despite having only 11 players availbale

--Staying put: The football team remained at No. 7 in this week's Southern California rankings as the top nine spots went unchanged. No. 5 Bakersfield is the only WSC team ahead of the Cougars (5-1, 4-0).

--Middles make a difference: Shabnam Irilian and Adrienne Winkle deserve as much credit as anyone in the women's volleyball team's turnaround. The two have improved rapidly and established themselves as starting middle blockers, a position that was a notable weakness early in the season.

``The improvement at the middle blocker position has helped a lot,''said COC coach Lisa Hooper, whose team improved to 4-0 in conference by defeating Bakersfield and Hancock last week after starting the season 1-4.

The Cougars had lost key players at every position but didn't learn until August that their top returning middle would not be back because she was academically ineligible.

``That was a big blow,'' Hooper said. ``We weren't prepared. It was a source of a lot of stress since everything sets up around your middles.''

Winkle is just learning the position and Irilian, one of only two sophomores on the team, has ``turned it on in the last couple weeks,'' according to Hooper.

--Good fit: Although most of the players on COC's inaugural ice hockey club team lack competitive experience, freshman forward T.J. Henderson is not one of them. Henderson used to play at the Midget AA level at the Ice Station. Instead of trying to balance the time demands of his previous teams with school, Henderson opted to play for the Cougars.

``He should help us a lot,'' team advisor Jim Schrage said.