Posted: Sep 18, 2020

Forever Pirates -- Junior Tagaloa

Our next installment of Forever Pirates features former football wide receiver and current assistant coach Junior Tagaloa, who played for the Pirates and attended OCC from 1985-1987.

Many young athletes today have a plan set on how their athletic life will turn out before they pick up a ball or step on a court in today's current culture. Their story is written and their goals are set at such a young age. I did not grow up in this type of goal-setting household. Unlike the generation of today, I just thought about going fast and having fun in every sport I played and that was it!

By high school, I was a three sport athlete. I competed in baseball, football and track, in that order of importance to me at that time. I was fast and fearless but not big however, I was good enough to make a positive impact for the team. I did not know much about academic life after high school so high school athletics was my recess. I knew of family who played at major colleges but in the big picture, I had no clue what UCLA or USC was. In a nutshell, I thought after high school; get a job and work like my parents did and live out my life. Recess was over.

I had no plans, no goals and I got into a lot of trouble living in my present environment at the time. In order for me to get on track, I had to move out of that environment and start new. I made the decision to move from L.A. to Orange County to live with my aunt and I change my attitude and outlook on life. I got a job at a local grocery store and applied for the 1985 fall semester at Orange Coast College. I can remember vividly a conversation with my father with him telling me to try football again. Football was not my first sport especially graduating high school at 5'9" and 160 pounds, but the spring and summer of 1985, I grew to 6'2" 180, which kind of gave me a chance to compete in football.

Junior college and football? Recess and classes? OK. I enrolled in the 1985 summer football class and realized very quickly that I had physically matured for the sport and so did the offensive and defensive coaches. The coaching staff was great on both sides of the ball in regards to having small break out conversations with me. They took the time to educate and enlighten me that I can earn a scholarship if I play well and do well in school. I committed to myself to academics and the sport that summer.

I did well through summer camp to the point I earned the staring job over a returning starter but I was hit with a major setback on the Friday walk-through before our first game. Let's travel back to spring 1985. I attended El Camino College in the spring of 1985 where I was the old Junior Tagaloa. Rewind back to Friday walk-through, as I was waiting along with my teammates for walk through to start, Head Coach Dick Tucker walked up to me and told me that I was ineligible because of my poor spring semester at El Camino. DEVASTATED? Maybe ... but my goal orientated self stepped up and told myself, "sit out this season and bear down in the classroom and on the field and come back as the best!"

I was able to utilize the resources that Orange Coast College had to offer. I met with Diane Keegan, an academic counselor at Orange Coast College at the time. I told her my academic and athletic goals, which were:

Plan an academic schedule for the next two years to graduate with an AA degree
Earn an athletic scholarship through football.
Stay academically eligible throughout my two seasons.

I had recruited a team of individuals that I thought could help me achieve my goal to move on. Not just an academic advisor, but I partnered up with professors, trainers, coaches from other sports, administrators, and, most of all, my girlfriend, (and now my wife), Wendy. There were those times that I would try and cheat the day -- not often --- but to be honest, when I tried, she would be right on me; "Don't you have workouts right now? Don't you need to get up for class right now? Don't you have to do homework right now? Don't you have a rehab appointment with the trainer?" And the list would go on. Wendy was like the head coach, keeping me in line with all the position coaches keeping me in check.

My first eligible year was in the state of limbo for the entire spring. Coach Tucker retired and Orange Coast College was looking for a new head coach. Orange Coast College hired Coach Bill Workman of the Orange County powerhouse Edison High School. As a wide receiver, I was excited because Coach Workman was bringing in a throwing offense along with some throwing QB's. Coach Tucker ran a run-based offense with a one-wide-receiver set which I was not mad at since I had won the starting job the previous year but Coach Workman would make football exciting.

The 1986 season went well but we had a ton of untapped potential. We needed to mesh as a team ... coming together late with the new coaching staff, expanding the football relationship between the positions on the field, building off-field relations with each other and just getting to now each other as brothers.

My 1987 season was a life-changing experience for me. After my first season playing at OCC, there were some Division I schools that were already looking at me. Wendy had a plan for the 1987 season! We sat down one day and she opened up the Orange Coast College football press guide to the school record section. I had set or come close to records during the 1986 season so Wendy highlighted the wide receiver records and challenged me to break them ALL. CHALLENGE ACCEPTED!

Those two years are in the record books.

I was an All-Conference, All-State, All-American and the No. 1 junior college wide receiver in the nation after that season. My top-five schools that I picked to visit were Arizona State, Cal, Miami, Michigan and Illinois. I chose Cal to continue my collegiate journey. It is not about where I went but who I became in the process from beginning to end.

The crowning jewel of my Pirate resume is not the games I played or the records I broke, but the continued opportunities I have had to give back through coaching at OCC. I have had the privilege of being an Orange Coast College coach for most of the last 30 years. I have mentored/inspired/influenced athletes at OCC in football, baseball, and women's volleyball. I pride myself on keeping in touch with most of all of the OCC family that I have come in contact with since 1986.