DAILY PILOT HIGH SCHOOL FEMALE ATHLETE OF THE WEEK:Figueroa motivated to advance

A favorite game played by the Costa Mesa High girls’ basketball team on the bus to road games is the question game.

Players ask each other questions until someone screws up and answers one. An assortment of queries have led to answers.

Except for one.

What is junior point guard Michelle Figueroa’s future with Costa Mesa?

Figueroa wishes she had an answer.

On the one-hour trip to Yucaipa High today to play in the CIF Southern Section Division IV-AA semifinals, teammates will have plenty of time to ask Figueroa if this might be her last high school basketball game.

She hopes not. The road to helping the No. 3-seeded Mustangs (19-10) reach tonight’s 7:30 game against No. 2 Arrowhead Christian (23-5) of Redlands has been too much fun.

Figueroa says basketball has been her life since third grade. But with her mother, Gloria Giraldo, living in Colombia, Figueroa might have to let go of the ball after the season and move to her mother’s homeland.

“It’s kind of tough for me just to leave Costa Mesa and just go out there. I don’t even know if I’ll be able to play basketball,” said Figueroa, who was born in the U.S. “I wish my mom was here with me. She’s been gone for two or three years. I’ve seen her about four times.

“The last time I saw her, I don’t remember, it was awhile back.”

This summer, Figueroa said she and her two brothers plan to travel to Medellín to reunite with their mother. A ticket there is what Figueroa said she’ll first obtain.

“I’m kind of afraid. I don’t want [my mother] to get sad,” Figueroa said of buying a round-trip flight.

She’s not sure if she’ll leave Colombia and return to Costa Mesa to continue to live with her aunt, Estella Cruz.

One thing Figueroa is certain about is this is the season Costa Mesa can win its first section title since the 1992-93 season, when it won the Division III-A championship.

Costa Mesa Coach Jim Weeks agrees. With 10 players, this is his deepest team in his 15 years, saying, “Anything is possible with Michelle running the show, because she can penetrate, shoot and pass really well.”

The 5-foot-7 Figueroa is leading the Mustangs in the right direction. During the playoff run, she’s averaging 15.3 points and six assists per game as the floor leader. It’s a role she waited a year to assume.

A meniscus tear in her left knee forced her to sit out as a sophomore. But even if she were healthy, she still would’ve been sitting on the bench.

Figueroa said her grades were low. She said not having mom, or dad, Omar Figueroa, around affected her schoolwork.

“He hasn’t been there for me,” Figueroa said of Omar, who lives in Sacramento after he and Gloria divorced when Figueroa was a toddler. “It’s kind of weird, I talk to him, but I don’t have that feeling [of] father-daughter relationship.”

The person who Figueroa turns to for support is her brother, John Restrepo.

Figueroa goes to Restrepo, 24, for advice, mostly about competing. Restrepo played minor league baseball before Figueroa said a wrist injury ended the outfielder’s career last year.

“He’s been there for me, pushing me and doing everything [for me]. I see him more as a father than brother,” said Figueroa, adding that the encouragement has allowed her to earn mostly A’s and B’s this year. “When I’m playing, and I see my brother up there [in the stands], it motivates me, because I want to play good so he could be proud of me. He had to stop [playing baseball] because … he had like five surgeries, and I felt bad. My knee, it still hurts, and I’m afraid that the same thing is going to happen to me.

“I just want to play hard and hopefully keep on [and play in] college. If I get anywhere in basketball, I might stay.”

Now there’s a question for a teammate to ask Figueroa on the bus. What will keep her in the country? See if she answers.

MICHELLE FIGUEROA

Hometown: Costa Mesa

Born: Aug. 16, 1990

Height: 5-foot-7

Sport: Basketball

Position: Point guard

Coach: Jim Weeks

Favorite food: Fettuccine Alfredo

Favorite movie: “Love & Basketball”

Favorite athletic moment: Helping Costa Mesa advance to the CIF Southern Section Division IV-AA semifinals for the first time since the 1998-99 season by scoring 20 points and hitting three three-pointers in a 57-48 quarterfinal victory at Fairmont Prep of Anaheim Wednesday.

Week in review: Averaged 13 points and six assists per game in the Mustangs’ first playoff wins over Redlands Adventist Academy and La Quinta of Westminster.