Practice was winding down. The UCLA men’s tennis team was finishing stretching and packing up. Players were talking about where they were going to eat, while others were talking about what midterms they had to study for that week. Read more...
Photo: For Joseph Di Giulio, the tennis courts are where the sophomore finds solace, a place where he escapes from problems small and large. (Jose Ubeda/Daily Bruin staff)
Alfred Aboya had never seen snow. Clad in flip-flops and shorts, the 18-year-old unfolded his 6-foot-8 frame from the confines of the minivan that transported his life to the grounds of the Tilton School in New Hampshire, landing him on a prep school campus covered in a white blanket of winter weather. Read more...
Photo: Alfred Aboya played four seasons for UCLA, a pit stop in a journey that took him from his native Cameroon to prep school on the East Coast, college in Westwood and a professional career overseas. (Daily Bruin file photo)
Twenty-one years ago, in the spring of 1994, coach Cori Close, then the restricted-earnings coach for the UCLA women’s basketball team, was not prepared. She was dressed in sweats one Tuesday evening when Steve Lavin, her counterpart on the men’s basketball team, told her that she was coming with him to coach John Wooden’s apartment – he said she didn’t have a choice. Read more...
Photo: UCLA women’s basketball coach Cori Close first met John Wooden while working as a restricted-earnings coach for the Bruins. As she moved forward to be assistant coach for UCSB and finally head coach for UCLA, her relationship with Wooden influenced her approach to her job. (Erin Ng/Daily Bruin senior staff)
The town of Körmend, Hungary is about 145 miles away from Budapest, the nation’s capital. It’s about 5,235 miles away from Weston, Fla. And, as far as Gyorgy Goloman was concerned, it was about a world away from UCLA. Read more...
Photo: Coming from the town of Körmend, Hungary, freshman forward Gyorgy Goloman had to make the decision between playing professional basketball in Europe or going to the United States for college. After months of deliberation, Goloman decided to go to school in the United States, so he made the trip alone to Florida to join the private prep Sagemont School. (Aubrey Yeo/Daily Bruin senior staff)
Friends, teammates, competitors, sisters. UCLA swim and dive team members Montana and Ciara Monahan are all of those things to each other. They’ve never known life to be any other way. Read more...
Photo: Junior diver Montana Monahan (left) and freshman diver Ciara Monahan (right) are sisters on the UCLA dive team. The Monahan sisters picked up the sport of diving together after moving from the East Coast to home in Burbank that came with a swimming pool and a diving board. (Aubrey Yeo/Daily Bruin senior staff)
Two days before UCLA swim and dive was set to leave for last season’s Pac-12 tournament, Courtney Wilde was feeling ill. “I knew something was wrong when I woke up but I couldn’t really put my finger on what it was,” said the senior captain. Read more...
Photo: After blood clots in her lungs forced Courtney Wilde to miss the Pac-12 tournament last season, she leaned on the support from her team and family in the recovery. (Max Himmelrich/Daily Bruin)
The redshirt sophomore gymnast mounted onto the high bar, grabbed hold and let her body swing. She kicked herself up vertically and released her hands to reach out and grab the lower bar. Read more...
Photo: Redshirt sophomore gymnast Christine Peng-Peng Lee is starting her gymnastics career on a clean slate after overcoming years of adversity. (Angie Wang/Daily Bruin senior staff)
