Event Puts CSUN in Spotlight

Bob Hiegert attended Cal State Northridge when it was San Fernando Valley State; he graduated from the school in 1963, returned as a baseball coach in 1965 and has been athletic director since 1978.

But never has he seen more media attention focused at a Northridge athletic event than he did Tuesday night when the school staged a fund-raiser for John Flowers, a Northridge basketball recruit who lost both legs as a result of a car accident last summer.

“This is unprecedented,” Hiegert said from his perch near midcourt at the game. “It’s good to see people get out and really want to help someone like this.”

Hiegert said the only time he had been around nearly that many television camera crews was in September, 1978, when Lyman Bostock, a former Northridge baseball player, was shot to death. Bostock played for the Angels and was an all-star outfielder for the Minnesota Twins.

FREE-THROW RUNDOWN

Highs and lows from the Flowers halftime free-throwathon:

Highs:

Joshua Hay, the CSUN ballboy who organized the event, makes his first attempt on a bankshot.

Lori Costello, who played on the Northridge women’s team from 1984 to 1986, makes two of five representing radio station KIIS-FM.

Lows:

Tony Smith of the Lakers misses his first two attempts before making his final three.

Brett Lewis, KNBC sportscaster, shoots three air balls.

MOVING ON

Remy McCarthy, 36, who on Monday announced his resignation as the Oxnard men’s basketball coach, said his decision had little to do with the Condors’ failure to qualify for the Southern California regionals after losing their final six games of the season to finish 16-14.

“I don’t think what happened this year had a direct bearing on it,” McCarthy said. “We didn’t do as well as I had hoped, but we still had a winning season. I just came to the conclusion after some careful consideration that I want to do other things with my life right now. . . .

“I want to go back to school and get my (doctorate) and I can’t do that and coach at the same time.”

McCarthy, who coached at Oxnard for five seasons, did not rule out a return to coaching, but he said he wouldn’t be surprised if he stayed away.

“Coaching has a lot of rewards,” McCarthy said. “But it is very demanding of your time and your emotions.”

ROSE-COLORED VIEW

It might not be the most objective view, but Art Wallace does not think his decision to quit the Oxnard men’s team with four games left in the season will hurt him with college recruiters.

Wallace, a 6-foot-10 sophomore from Crane High in Chicago, was an All-Western State Conference North Division selection as a freshman, but was often in McCarthy’s doghouse this season before quitting.

“There are some people you can play for and some people you can’t,” Wallace said. “Basically, I just didn’t get along with (McCarthy) from the start of the year on. That’s what I’ll tell recruiters if they ask what happened.”

Wallace, who averaged 10.7 points and 7.5 rebounds a game this season, said DePaul, Nevada Las Vegas and Wyoming have shown interest in him.

WHO’S NO. 1?

Despite being ranked No. 1 in the state since early in the season, the Ventura College men’s basketball team is conspicuously missing from the weekly rankings compiled by the National Junior College Athletic Assn.

In fact, no California team is included in the men’s and women’s national rankings. The exclusion is not an oversight.

“The reason is that California has its own governing body for its community colleges,” said Sarah Thompson, assistant to George E. Killian, the NJCAA’s executive director. “(California junior colleges) are not members of the national organization. They are pretty much the only state we don’t have a fully fledged membership for.”

Walter Rilliet, state commissioner of junior college athletics, said he wishes that California schools earned national recognition as they did in the 1950s and ‘60s. But he said the state decided to operate as an autonomy for various reasons.

“In the middle ‘70s, we came into severe financial restraints,” Rilliet said. “It was deemed we had enough schools and teams to play sports within our (state) boundaries. We could have our own regional and state championships without having to travel out of the state.

“For us to go to the national championships would call for a great deal of travel and time away from class.”

Rilliet said that 100 of the 107 junior colleges in the state have athletics programs. None, however, will soon become nationally known under the current system. That leaves Philip Mathews, who has coached Ventura to a 32-1 record, with mixed feelings.

“We are concerned about California,” Mathews said. “But I think they should rank us anyway.”

TOUGH DEFENSE

Although Northridge baseball Coach Bill Kernen put together his lineup with offense in mind, the 14th-ranked Matadors (8-0) are playing excellent defense. They have turned 18 double plays and committed only four errors.

Even one of the errors, by third baseman Andy Small, was impressive--to a point. Small snared a hard-hit grounder to his left, spun, then made a throw that was too high for first baseman Jason Shanahan.

The most unusual double play was turned against San Diego by Chris Olsen, who is playing second base for the first time in his career. With one out and a runner on first, Olsen bypassed the traditional 4-6-3 option and fielded a grounder, made a lunging tag of the runner and with an off-balance throw beat the runner to first by a hair.

MONUMENTAL HOMER

It was not just another home run. In fact, it was the first of its kind and Cal State Northridge softball player Tamara Ivie knows it.

Ivie’s 225-foot homer Feb. 11 off UCLA senior ace Lisa Fernandez was the first allowed by Fernandez in four seasons covering 72 games and 448 2/3 innings. Ivie, tied for second on the Matador all-time home run list with six, won’t soon forget the feat. Fernandez, who is 65-4 at UCLA, is a three-time All-American and two-time Honda Award winner, emblematic of the nation’s best collegiate softball player.

Although Ivie’s fourth-inning home run was but a whisper in the Matadors’ 7-2 loss in the second game of a doubleheader, it was one of two earned runs charged to Fernandez, who gave up only four earned runs in 196 1/3 innings last season.

JUST CALL ME FERDIE

When Northridge left fielder David Prosenko stepped into the batter’s box Saturday at Loyola Marymount, the public address announcer introduced him as David Prochenko. For his second at-bat he was introduced as Ferdie Pacheco. The third time up he was referred to as Daaa-vid Prosenko.

As it turns out, the announcer, former LMU player Matt Marks, played at San Jose City College with Prosenko and has maintained a close friendship with him. Prosenko said he was able to maintain his concentration because his friend had warned him that he would mangle his name.

DISTAFF DUNKER

Northridge opponents in women’s basketball have done a variety of embarrassing things to the Matadors (5-18) this season.

But no one has dunked on them.

The only woman collegian reportedly to dunk in a game is 6-foot-7 Georgeann Wells of West Virginia, who graduated in 1986. She dunked twice during the 1984-85 season, and the basketball and a photo of the first dunk are in the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass.

But on Sunday, the Matadors played USC and 6-foot-5 junior All-American Lisa Leslie, who dunks in practice and has tried several times to dunk in games.

“As a team, we said before the game, ‘We’re not going to let her dunk on us,’ ” Matador Michelle Esparza said.

Esparza had to live up to that pledge in the first half.

Leslie stole the ball in the backcourt and with no one in front of her, dribbled in for a dunk attempt. She approached the hoop from the right side of the key and went up.

But Esparza raced back and fouled Leslie just as she went up for the possible historic moment and the ball clanged off the rim. The women’s college game was denied its first dunk since 1985.

Leslie’s coach, Marianne Stanley, said Leslie has tried several times to slam in a game.

“Twice she’s dunked but it hasn’t been a clear dunk,” Stanley said. “It hit the rim, popped up and went in.”

So it’s a goal of Leslie’s?

“Definitely. I practice dunking twice a week,” Leslie said. “I’ve done it in summer leagues.”

ON THE UP AND UP

Said Matador Coach Kim Chandler after her team’s 78-36 loss to 18th-ranked USC: “They’re on our schedule for one reason. We’re looking for a future, looking for a direction, so our players can understand just what they have to do to get to that level.”

The Matadors found their direction: Straight up.

Eight of the Trojans’ 13 players are listed at 6-foot or taller, including two at 6-5. CSUN has one such player--6-2 freshman reserve Maureen Batiste.

NO TIGER BY THE TAIL

Cal Lutheran basketball fans will get a chance to see Occidental’s Blair Slattery, arguably the best player in the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference, tonight when the Kingsmen play host to Occidental in their final regular-season game. The Kingsmen have a chance to clinch at least a tie for the SCIAC championship.

Slattery was so impressive in the first CLU-Occidental game on Feb. 10 that CLU Coach Mike Dunlap said his team would not have posted an 89-80 victory if Slattery hadn’t fouled out with 4 minutes 23 seconds left in the game.

“If he doesn’t get in foul trouble we don’t win the game,” Dunlap said flatly.

With a quick release, Slattery hit nine of 14 shots from the field, including all four attempts from beyond the three-point line. Slattery, a 6-foot-6 junior from San Marino, finished with 27 points, 11 rebounds, and five assists.

PROGRESS

George Kuntz, recently hired to head the women’s soccer program at Pepperdine, had to contend with only one team when he took over the Cal Lutheran program in 1988--men’s varsity.

“When I started I was being paid very little,” Kuntz said. “Probably less than an average high school coach.”

But Kuntz spearheaded the drive to add a women’s team in 1989 and since then has coached both teams and taught public speaking, radio production and athletics courses at the university, turning his once-limited job into a demanding full-time position with corresponding pay and increased visibility.

Cal Lutheran is searching for Kuntz’s replacement and probably will not split up the men’s and women’s jobs, according to women’s assistant Scott Murray.

“I applied for the women’s job if they were going to split the programs,” Murray said. “My understanding is that they will keep one coach for the two teams. After seeing what it did to George, I decided that it’s just too much work to run both.”

Kennedy Cosgrove and staff writers Fernando Dominguez, Mike Hiserman, Paige A. Leech, Theresa Munoz and John Ortega contributed to this notebook.