Kauppila, Cardinal can’t complete big comeback at Chapel Hill
GLENDALE — The following are updates on local athletes at the collegiate level.
Lonnie Kauppila (Crescenta Valley High, 2008) Stanford baseball, freshman: After having their rally extinguished by the rain on Saturday, Kauppila and the Cardinal saw their season and shot at the College World Series end with a 7-5 loss to the host University of North Carolina on the second day of Super Regional action at Chapel Hill.
Stanford (35-22), which suffered its first loss in the opening round of the double-elimination tournament to the Tar Heels on Friday, scratched out a one-run lead in the bottom of the first inning on Saturday, but fell behind, 3-1, in the fourth and trailed, 6-1, going into the bottom of the eighth.
There the Cardinal put up four runs, capped by a three-run double by Austin Wilson, before a three hour and 32 minute rain delay put a damper on the comeback. Once play resumed, Stanford surrendered an insurance run to UNC in the top of the ninth before being retired in order in the bottom half.
Kauppila played second base and went one for four with a run scored, his only hit in seven at bats in the Super Regional. The former Falcon, who began his high school baseball career at Crescenta Valley before transferring to Burbank as a junior, was coming off a more successful showing at the Cal State Fullerton Regional. Kauppila closed out the two-game tournament, which included wins over Fullerton and Illinois, with a three-hit, three-run-batted-in game in the Cardinal’s 14-2 win over the Illini.
On the season, he batted .298 with a home run, 25 RBI, 24 runs scored and 10 doubles.
Rachel Lange (Crescenta Valley High, 2008) Brigham Young University women’s track and field, junior: Lange contributed some valuable points to the Cougars in pursuit of their third straight Mountain West Conference outdoor championship on May 13 in Fort Collins, Colo.
The former Falcons cross-country and track standout placed sixth in the finals of the 10,000 meters in 37 minutes, 19.38 seconds to help BYU win the meet with 191 points. New Mexico came in second with 128 points and Texas Christian finished third with 98 points.
Lange was one of three Cougars to place in the event, as teammates Cecily Lemmon-Lew and Morgan Haws took first (36:11.41) and second (36:14.73), respectively.
Rosa Del Toro (Glendale Community College, 2010) Long Beach State women’s track and field, junior: Del Toro, the 2010 California Community College Athletic Assn. state champion in the 1,500 meters, capped off her first year at Long Beach State by finishing second in the 1,500 in 4:29.04 at the Big West Conference Championships at UC Irvine on May 15.
After winning her May 14 preliminary heat over Cal Poly’s Vanessa Hancock by just .14 seconds in 4:39.13, Del Toro finished 1.31 seconds behind Hancock in the finals. Del Toro moved up to fifth-best on the 49ers’ all-time list in the 1,500 with her finals time.
Also competing for Long Beach State in the Big West championships was Del Toro’s former Vaqueros teammate Nina Moore, who placed seventh in the 10,000 on May 14 in 36:28.37, which ranks her seventh in Long Beach State history.
Long Beach State placed fourth in the meet with 98.5 points, 6.5 behind third-place UC Davis and 67 points behind championCal State Northridge.
Angelina Gonzalez (Glendale Community College, 2010) Westmont College women’s track and field, junior: In her first year at Santa Barbara’s Westmont, Gonzalez took her signature event, the 3,000-meter steeplechase, all the way to the National Assn. of Intercollegiate Athletics Outdoor National Championships at Indiana Wesleyan University on May 26.
Gonzalez, who won a Western State Conference championship in the event last season while at Glendale college, placed ninth in her heat and 26th overall in the preliminary round with a time of 11:52, but did not advance to the finals. Westmont finished 52nd overall in the meet.
Gonzalez’ top mark in the steeplechase this year was a 10:48.22 recorded Feb. 19 at the Westmont Triangular.
Christine Cho (Crescenta Valley High, 2008) Harvard University women’s golf, junior: Based on her strong performance at the 2011 Ivy League Women’s Golf Championship April 22-24 at Atlantic City Country Club in Northfield, N.J., Cho was named to the All-Ivy League second team for the second year in a row.
Cho improved her scores each round to finish with a three-round score of 230 (79-77-74), which was 10th best in the tournament.
Harvard shot a three-round score of 917, finishing second overall behind Yale (913) on the strength of a 295 in the final round after carding a first-round 313 and a 309 in the second.