Empowered Women Series: Leigh Marshall
Leigh Marshall has made Palomar's women's basketball program the winningest one in San Diego County junior college history. Marshall has led the Comets to a 196-87 record, including numerous conference championships, three state elite eight runs and a state final four run.
Marshall began coaching right after college. She coached at a high school and was the assistant coach for her alma mater, Orange Coast Community College, for five years. After coaching there for a couple of years, she applied for the job at Palomar. She needed her own program. The only problem, it was September and the official season start date was one month away.
"When this opportunity came up, my Orange Coast College coach, Mike Thornton, who's like my second dad, he was like, 'Don't take it,'" Marshall said. "I took it because I was like, 'This is my chance, and I don't know if I'll ever get another chance.'"
In her first season, Marshall had to recruit players from other sports teams on campus because she had no team. Now, she had players lining the bench at every game waiting for their opportunity to play.
In her third season at the helm, Marshall won her first conference championship. That year, they were seeded 15th and they defeated Saddleback College at home after being down 15 points. They then went on the road to face Ventura College, the No. 2 seed and defeated them. The run ended when they met Moorpark College in the next round. It's one of her favorite memories from her time at Palomar.
Fast-forward to the 2019-20 season. The team made it back to the Elite Eight for their third appearance in four years, but couldn't complete the season due to COVID-19.
"We went through a lot of adversity off the court and to be able to get back to the state Elite Eight was really special for us too," Marshall said. "And then as terrible as it was ending our season with COVID, it's like you won your last game. Looking back that's one of the positives they take out of it. Not too many people can ever say they did that with the season."
Outside of Palomar, Marshall coaches for Coastal Elite, a local travel basketball club. Coastal has the coach of the team stay with the team until they age out of the club. When Marshall began in 2013, she started with a second and third-grade boys' team because they didn't have a girls team established yet.
"My boys are 16-years now, which is crazy," Marshall said. "They're sophomores in high school and they're huge. I used to look down at them. I'm only five four and now I'm looking up at them all. I love it."
She was introduced to the club because of her assistant coaches, Chris Kroesch and Damian Cephas. Marshall only has two years left with her boys and she's thinking about doing it again. She says she also has never had a problem being female coaching boys.
"I coach them like an athlete," she said. "I don't coach them as boys, and I don't coach my girls as girls. I just coach. It's been one of the things I look forward to, especially during COVID."
While Palomar opted out of the Early Spring season, which basketball fell into, Marshall and her boys traveled to Arizona, Utah and outside of the county to continue playing.
"Without them and without having practice with them and being able to coach, like everybody else, it's hard," she said. "It's been an amazing experience."
Marshall started playing basketball because of the boys in her neighborhood. She grew up as a latchkey kid and had good friends on her street. After taking the bus home from school, the boys would go to the park and play basketball, so Marshall joined them.
She played on her high school team and her best friend ended up going to Orange Coast. Marshall played two years there and Mike Thornton asked if she wanted to join the coaching staff there.
Marshall remembers him saying, "'I think you would be a great coach. Have you thought about doing that?'"
Well, she did, and the rest is history.