Area Pair Make Elite Water Polo Team

One former and one current member of the Harvard High water polo team have been selected to the junior national team, according to national team Coach Ricardo Azevado.

Larry Bercutt, who graduated in June, and Jim Toring, who will be a sophomore in the fall, will represent the United States in the Junior Pan American Games in Ponce, Puerto Rico, Aug. 10-16.

Bercutt, a goalie, is headed to Stanford on a water polo scholarship. He was named a second-team All-American after his senior year.

Toring, who just turned 16, is the youngest player ever selected for the junior national team. Toring was named a fourth-team All-American.

Azevado is the water polo coach at Long Beach Poly.

The Agoura Bratz and the Simi Valley Wildcats have qualified for the major division (age 18-and-under) softball nationals Aug. 8-12 in Lodi. Both teams qualified by winning state tournaments in July.

Laura Staatz of Paraclete High won five games for the Bratz in a recent state tournament in Anaheim Hills. The Bratz defeated the Orange County Athletics, 4-3, Sunday in the final. Melissa Thatcher knocked in the winning run with a seventh-inning single.

Thatcher had 10 hits in the six-game tournament.

The third Las Virgenes Summer Soccer Classic for boys and girls will be held Aug. 10-13. Nearly 100 teams in seven age divisions--with players ranging from age 11 to 19--will participate, including squads from British Columbia and Mexico. Games will be played at Oak Park, Westlake and Agoura highs.

Information: 818-991-3075.

The ninth Basketball Unlimited youth basketball camp will be held at the Lake View Terrace Recreation Center on Sunday, from 9 a.m. until 1 p.m.

Boys and girls aged 7 to 17 are invited to attend. There is a fee of $3.

Information: 818-702-0755.

Canyon High has named boys’ and girls’ soccer coaches for the 1990-91 season.

Mike Harvey, who skippered the Canyon girls’ team to the Southern Section 2-A Division playoffs last year, replaces Gary Lindberg as the boys’ coach.

Lindberg will continue to coach track and assist with varsity football.

Francois Wolman, who coached cross-country at Notre Dame in 1987 and Bell-Jeff in 1988, will inherit a girls’ program that placed second in the Golden League last year.

All 10 of Antelope Valley College’s football games will be seen live throughout the high-desert area on cable television.

The games, on KVVT Channel 64, can be seen in Barstow, Mojave, Ridgecrest and Victor Valley as well as the Palmdale and Lancaster areas. Antelope Valley will open the season Sept. 8 at San Diego City College.

Melanie Clarke of Valley College will compete in the high jump and 400 meters in an international junior track and field meet in Columbus, Ohio, on Saturday and Sunday.

Clarke, 18, The Athletics Congress junior national heptathlon champion, placed seventh (55 seconds) in the 400 meters and ran a leg on the West’s 1,600-meter relay team two weeks ago in the Olympic Festival.

Clarke originally had planned to conclude her season after the TAC meet, but she said that she also will represent the U.S. junior national team in a dual meet against Canada next month.