PCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament : The Holmestretch: Her Next Game Is Life

For nearly 16 years, Robin Holmes’ life revolved around a basketball. Now, as the Cal State Fullerton women’s season nears an end, so does Holmes’ involvement with the game.

“I’m ready to hang up my basketball shoes,” said Holmes, the Titans’ all-time leading scorer.

What’s left? Fullerton opens the Pacific Coast Athletic Assn. tournament at 3 p.m. today against Hawaii at Cal State Long Beach.

“It’s been fun, nice and enriching but I’m ready to go on to something else.”

A four-year starter who hasn’t missed a game in her collegiate career, Holmes understands the dilemma of the amateur athlete who has nowhere to go after competing in college. And she has prepared herself for what may lie ahead by majoring in clinical psychology.

She says she has little sympathy for athletes who have a difficult time meeting eligibility standards, much less graduating.

“A lot of them don’t go to classes; they simply don’t try,” she said. “They’re majoring in sports, not school.

“I’m looking forward to being a normal student. I’m carrying 20 units and I’m ready to pull my hair out because basketball is conflicting. It’s really been very hard.

“I was going to coach but I had to decide between clinical psychology and coaching and I chose clinical psychology.”

Five years working toward a Ph.D seems like a short time compared to the years she spent sharpening basketball skills that made her one of the West Coast’s premier guards.

“Our whole family played the game,” Holmes said. “I remember days when we would go out and play until the sun went down. There was no gym to be a gym rat in but if there’s such a thing for outdoor courts, I was one.”

It wasn’t until her sophomore year in high school that she developed other interests, most notably psychology, but even then, basketball was the top priority.

“I still played. I just didn’t play every minute of every day,” she said.

Her game was influenced by her brother, Ron Holmes, one of the stars who led USC to the Pacific-10 championship last season.

“Even during his last year in college, we’d go outside to work on our individual games,” she said. “He’d help me with my outside shooting and I’d help him with his defense. It was more of a one-to-one interaction sort of thing. We didn’t actually go out there and play each other.”

At Cal State Fullerton, Holmes hasn’t been troubled by an identity crisis as much as she has been by a player shortage.

Holmes, a natural at the wing position, spent most of her junior season at the point, and her offensive production suffered. After scoring 15.4 points a game as a sophomore, her average fell to 12.5 last season. As an off-guard this season, she is averaging 20.1 points.

Opponents have used box-and-one defenses to try to stop her. She is expecting Hawaii to use one today, as it did with little success when Holmes scored 28 and 18 points, respectively, in Fullerton’s victories over the Rainbows during conference play.

“It all depends on whether it’s well executed or not,” she said. “UCLA played it real well (in a 62-57 Bruins victory last Saturday) and I couldn’t do anything but sit there and watch the game go by. It’s frustrating because they hold you, push you and you end up working harder than anybody else while rarely getting the ball.”

If the Titans win today they will advance to the semifinals Friday at the Forum.

Holmes would like nothing better than to lead the Titans into the NCAA tournament, which they can reach by winning the PCAA tourney. But considering their 10-17 regular season record and the fact that they have to get past Long Beach, one of the country’s best teams, that doesn’t seem likely.

Holmes, however, is prepared for the end, which, in essence, will bring a new beginning.