College Notebook : CSUN Hits on Average Formula for Success

A quick glance at Cal State Northridge’s baseball statistics begs one question: How have the Matadors managed to lose 18 games?

CSUN is hitting .329 as a team, and averaging 8.1 runs a game.

Catcher Gerry Bernard is hitting .302 and is the laughingstock of the starting lineup. He’s got the lowest average.

Paul Kaplan leads the team in hitting at .388, with 12 home runs and 41 runs batted in.

Mark Ban hit four home runs and had 10 RBIs last week, and raised his average to .366. He has 19 home runs and a conference-leading 68 RBIs.

Dick Jacquez is now hitting .344 with 7 home runs and 41 RBIs. His specialty is doubles. He had five last week to give him 21 for the season, nine shy of the school record.

The hottest hitting Matador is Bryant Long. He has raised his batting average from .295 to .355 in two weeks. He has 10 home runs and 49 RBIs.

CSUN is 37-18-1 despite all the hitting, however, mostly because the team earned-run average is 4.67.

Add Stats: Two of the state’s best community college hitters lately are Bill Bluhm of College of the Canyons and Tom Brandt of Pierce.

Bluhm started the week batting .400 (44 for 109) with 14 home runs and 32 RBIs. Brandt has a .425 average and has hit in 13 consecutive conference games.

Neither has been forced to face Glendale College’s Wally Ritchie, though. The sophomore pitcher owns some of the Valley area’s most impressive numbers.

He is 10-2, has a 1.84 ERA and has 113 strikeouts in 93 innings. He has allowed only 72 hits and 29 walks.

The left-hander’s next outing is today at home against Citrus.

Ritchie was an All-Southern Section selection at Hoover High, then attended Brigham Young University as a freshman. He transferred to Glendale last fall.

Moorpark College basketball player Kip Brown has verbally committed to attend Oral Roberts University next fall.

Moorpark basketball Coach Al Nordquist said Wednesday that Brown reached his decision Tuesday after also considering a move to the University of Washington.

Brown, a forward, helped in the Raiders’ drive to a second-place finish in the Western State Conference this season. He transferred to Moorpark from Oral Roberts after his freshman season.

Brown had earlier ruled out a return to the Tulsa school after ORU Coach Dick Acres was asked to resign, but he changed his mind this week after meeting with new coach Ted Owens.

Another Oral Roberts transfer, guard Woody Jones, may also transfer back, according to Nordquist.

Jones redshirted a year at Oral Roberts, then transferred to Moorpark along with Brown after both experienced difficulties with their grades. He would be a sophomore next year at Oral Roberts, while Brown would be a junior.

Both players must complete a total of 24 units of C work before again enrolling at Oral Roberts.

Jones must pass 16 units this spring, while Jones has to complete 18. Both players also must make up courses during the summer.

Three years ago, Cal State Northridge won a Division II national championship in women’s tennis.

Since then, the team hasn’t even been invited to the playoffs. Until this week.

CSUN tied with Cal Poly Pomona for the California Collegiate Athletics Assn. championship this spring, and Monday the team received an at-large berth to the championship tournament beginning May 6 at the Glen Racquet Club in Bakersfield.

The Lady Matadors are one of four unseeded teams in the tournament. CSUN will play No. 1-ranked Tennessee Chattanooga in the first round. Notre Dame College is seeded No. 2, Southern Illinois is No. 3, while CCAA champion Pomona is seeded fourth.

Northridge’s top three singles players, Marla Reid, Missy Conn and Susie Campbell are entered in singles competition.

The doubles teams of Campbell-Cindy Woodhouse and Reid-Conn also qualified for the tournament.

The CSUN softball team will tune up for the upcoming playoffs at the Cal State Sacramento Invitational Tournament beginning today.

CSUN, the defending tournament champion, plays UC Davis in its first round game of the double elimination tournament. Other teams in the tournament are sixth-ranked Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, Portland State, Chapman, Chico State, Cal State Dominguez Hills and host Sacramento.

The Lady Matadors, ranked No. 2 in the nation, have a 51-15 overall record and have already qualified for the Division II regional playoffs that begin May 10.

After a three-year absence, cross country will be reinstated at Pierce College next fall.

Bob Chambers, who retired from coaching at Pierce in 1978, will also make a return as coach.

Chambers was one of America’s top middle distance runners in the late 1940s and early 1950s. He placed sixth in the 800 meters at the 1948 Olympics.

The CCAA decathlon and heptathlon championships will be held Friday and Saturday at CSUN. Among the CSUN athletes entered in the decathlon are defending conference champion Steve Roberts, Dio Giuliano, John Wotawa, Larry Stuck and Al Ros. In the heptathlon, CSUN has entered Sue Patterson, Kim Turner, Debbie Cole and Chris Culotta. The rest of the CCAA track and field championships will be held May 10-11 at Cal State Los Angeles. The Northridge men are defending conference champions.

Notes

Home sweet home: The Northridge baseball team is 21-4-1 at Matador Field. . . . CSUN outside hitter Chuck English received an honorable mention selection to the All-California Interscholastic Volleyball Assn. team. English is the first Matador player to be picked on the team in the two years CSUN has been a member of the conference. . . .

Michey McAnany and Dave Shaffer have been honored as CSUN’s Athletes of the Month. McAnany, a senior third baseman, led the Lady Matadors’ softball team to the championship of the Libby Matson Tournament at the University of Pacific in Stockton. Shaffer, a 6-7 1/2 middle-blocker on the men’s volleyball team, won the award for his outstanding overall play throughout the season. . . .

CSUN announced the signing of Heather Brooks and Kimberly Sterton to national letters of intent on Thursday. Brooks, is a distance runner from Bonita Vista High in San Diego. Sterton, from Mt. Carmel High and Mira Costa Community College, is a middle distance runner.

THE CSUN HIT PARADE

Name AB H HR RBI Avg Paul Kaplan 170 66 12 41 .388 Mark Ban 213 78 19 68 .366 Bryant Long 197 70 10 49 .355 Dick Jaquez 174 60 7 45 .344 Gerry Bernard 139 42 8 29 .302 Team 1890 623 85 403 .329