First-year Dos Pueblos girls’ basketball coach Manny Murillo is looking to build a culture of winning at his alma mater and has already found success early after making the jump from his championship-winning youth development program — Santa Barbara Pro Skills Academy — to the high school level this year.
For the past several years, Murillo, or “Coach Manny” as his players call him, has laid the foundation for his coaching career, starting S.B. Pro Skills first as a personal trainer before taking over several youth-level club teams, from 5th grade to 8th grade.
In those years, his club teams have gone on to win national and regional titles, and players who have started out in his program have gone on to great success all over the Santa Barbara area. In 2021, at least four girls who are S.B. Pro Skills alumni were named Santa Barbara Athletic Round Table Player of the Week: San Marcos’s Michelle Arellanes, Bishop Diego’s Clara McDonald, and Dos Pueblos’s Lily Mires and Leila Chisholm.