Aniya Baker Selected As New Women's Basketball Head Coach
Former San Jose State Spartan Aniya Baker has been named De Anza College's new women’s basketball head coach. She officially started in her role on Jan. 4, 2021.
Baker brings experience from four-year university, high school and AAU levels – as a player, assistant coach, head coach, teacher and trainer.
"We are excited to welcome coach Baker to the De Anza College athletics family - and look forward to many years of success for our women's basketball program under her leadership," said De Anza's dean of physical education and athletics Eric Mendoza.
"We are confident our student-athletes and the Mountain Lions campus community will be inspired by Aniya's positive energy and passion for helping others reach their goals. She will be a great role model for our students and be a champion for our athletic department's overall mission."
Baker played basketball collegiately at UC Davis (2012-13, Big West All-Freshman Team selection), San Jose State (2014-16) and Grand Canyon University (2016-17). As a standout point guard on the court, she also excelled academically as an Honor Roll student. She graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Organizational Studies from San Jose State in 2016 and a Master’s degree in Business Administration from Grand Canyon in 2018.
She recently served as an assistant coach at Cal State Dominguez Hills during the 2019-2020 season – helping the Toros to 13 wins and three players to All-CCAA selections, including Newcomer of the Year guard Arianna Harper.
Under head coach John Bonner, Baker was in charge of several administrative duties, including gameday operations, team travel logistics, program equipment, and recruitment tours. She also assisted with gameday and practice planning, scouting, video breakdown, skill development, and student-athlete academic advising.
Before joining the Toros, she spent two seasons (2017-19) as the girls’ junior varsity head coach, varsity assistant coach, and strength & conditioning coach at her alma mater Perris High School. She was in charge of all off-season workouts, training girls and boys.
She also worked for Los Angeles-based Veritas Training Academy (2018-19) as the head coach, skill development coach, and director of the 17U national girls’ team.
Baker was raised in a basketball family. Her father, Jemarl Baker Sr., played at Cal State Northridge and coached at Los Angeles Southwest College; and her brother, Jemarl Baker Jr., is a current starting shooting guard at the University of Arizona (transfer from the University of Kentucky). Jemarl was recently named PAC-12 Player of the Week.
As a high school standout at Perris, Baker was a McDonald’s All-American honorable mention and All-CIF Southern Section selection. She averaged 19.8 points and 7.3 assists as a senior; and was twice voted Sunbelt League Most Valuable Player.
At UC Davis, Baker finished second on the team in assists (51) and third in steals (48), and three-point attempts (68). As a sophomore at San Jose State, she led the team in assists (119) – ranking fifth in the Mountain West Conference. She was also third in the conference in assist-to-turnover ratio. Baker led Grand Canyon in steals (50) as a senior.
"I'm extremely excited for the opportunity to be the head women’s basketball coach at De Anza College," Baker said.
"I'm humbled and greatly appreciative of Athletic Director Kulwant Singh and Dean Eric Mendoza for giving me the opportunity to work with an outstanding group of young women. Coming to De Anza presents an opportunity to impact our student-athletes' lives in a positive way - to exhaust every resource possible to create champions both on and off the playing field. My utmost priority is spending time and developing relationships with our current student-athletes, as well as the young women who will make up the future of De Anza Basketball."
Baker takes over for Mike Allen, who accepted a coaching position at his alma mater William Jessup University.
Last season, De Anza completed a remarkable 18-10 regular season campaign – capped with the Coast-South Conference championship - the school’s first title since the 2013-14 season. The team advanced to the CCCAA Northern California playoffs as the No. 17 seed.