The doctor is in

  DAVE HILL/Daily Bruin Senior Staff Freshman guard
Gennifer Arranaga has her priorities straight,
putting her dreams of becoming a forensic pathologist before
basketball.

By Scott Schultz
Daily Bruin Contributor

Talking to freshman guard Gennifer Arranaga, you immediately
sense that she is not your typical college basketball player. She
is equally willing to discuss preon-based brain diseases with you
as she is about her game.

For Arranaga, a biology major, academics is her top priority,
followed by basketball. Her goals do not involve Olympic dreams or
professional athletic aspirations. She wants to witness an autopsy
first hand, go to medical school and pursue her longtime dream of
becoming a forensic pathologist.

When Arranaga was attending Centennial High School in Corona,
she was a four-year All-League player and a four-time
scholar-athlete, but never wore her letterman’s jacket.

Instead, she wore medical scrubs every Halloween when she was a
kid. Her favorite class in high school was anatomy, and her
favorite books are on forensic pathology.

“People think I’m kind of weird because I want to
cut people open and analyze them, but I don’t look at it as
gross,” Arranaga said. “You’re analyzing and
learning about what happened to someone.”

She was admitted to UCLA on her academics, and it was only after
she got accepted here that she was invited to join the
women’s basketball team by UCLA head coach Kathy Olivier, who
had seen her in a summer travel league.

Arranaga was offered a basketball scholarship to Cal State
Fullerton, but as soon as she received her acceptance letter from
UCLA, she knew she was Westwood-bound.

“I would rather pay to go to UCLA than go to Fullerton for
free,” said Arranaga, whose father also attended UCLA.

“For Gen, the academic part is important to her and
that’s why she goes to UCLA,” Olivier said.
“Basketball is her second priority and I think that’s
great. We stress the balance here. That’s what our program is
about.”

Not that Arranaga isn’t having an impressive frosh season.
She is averaging 3.7 points per game while providing a valuable
spark off the bench. At one time, she was among the Pac-10 leaders
in steals.

Dr. Edward “Chip” Anderson, a professor of the UCLA
Graduate School of Education and Information and a former
scholarship athlete, explained that student-athletes have to
compensate for the additional time and energy that they expend on
their sports. This can have negative impacts on players,
particularly freshman who are making the transition from high
school to college.

“Athletes have a lot of emotional roller coasters because
their sport is important to them,” Anderson said. “The
highs and lows of the sport can’t help but impact other
facets of their life.”

“For example, you’ve just gone through a
disappointing competition and you have a big test the next day; to
gear yourself up and go through that is very challenging,” he
added.

Arranaga stumbled a little in her first quarter academically.
Although her grades were above average, her GPA was short of
medical school standards. But Arranaga says she has a better
concept of what is expected of her academically at UCLA. She
stresses the importance of time management. She studies more than
20 hours per week, including time with tutors.

“Gennifer takes her academics very, very seriously,”
said assistant coach Pam Walker, who is Arranaga’s academic
advisor. “She’s someone who takes great pride in that.
She wants to do well academically.”

Arranaga says that she can apply her court sense to her
academics and her classroom lessons to the court.

“Athletics puts me in a competitive mindframe, and when I
get a B on an exam, I want an A the next time,” Arranaga
said. “In the classroom, you need patience to work things
out. I find that’s often the case on the court as
well.”

Anderson suggests that several positive factors such as goal
setting, fighting through points of discouragement, and creating
your own motivation can be relocated from athletic competition to
academic excellence.

Arranaga understands that many students change their career
goals during their four years of college, and admitted that she
just might get freaked out at the first sight of a cadaver.

But even though she enjoys playing hoops for the Blue and Gold,
Arranaga is here for the diploma.

“It’s not just about the sports, there’s a lot
more to being a complete person,” Arranaga said. “Your
physical abilities will last only so long, but your education and
knowledge will last you forever.”