UCLA, USC to Meet on Track Today

Today’s UCLA-USC track and field meet at Drake Stadium won’t be as competitive and stirring as some in the past. But new coaches Bob Larsen of UCLA and Ernie Bullard of USC say they intend to make the rivalry more significant in the future.

Right now, it’s all UCLA. The Bruins have an 8-0 record. USC is 6-1, losing only to California, 93-68. Cal, in turn, lost to UCLA, 88-75.

USC, a private school with higher tuition costs than UCLA, was weakened as a dual-meet power by NCAA scholarship restrictions. A school is allowed 14 track scholarships, or the equivalent. At USC, an athlete on a half scholarship would still have to pay about $5,000 to go to school.

The Trojans could win 7 of the 19 events today, but they can’t stay with the Bruins in the distance races, 110-meter hurdles, 400 meters and some field events.

UCLA has won six straight (the teams didn’t meet in 1982) and 10 of the last 12. Even so, the Bruins trail in the overall series, 38-13, which is understandable considering that USC won 33 straight from UCLA before the Bruins finally got their first win in 1966.

USC’s Darwin Cook and teammate Antonio Manning are expected to dominate the sprints. USC probably will win the sprint relay, long jump and triple jump with Ed Tave and Mike Pullins, the pole vault with Steve Klassen and the hammer throw with John Wolitarsky.

UCLA should dominate the hurdles, with Steve Kerho and Raymond Young; the 400, with Dwyan Biggers and Anthony Washington; the distance races, with Mark Junkerman, Rich Brownsberger, Jim Ortiz and Jerry Marsh, and the weight events, high jump and javelin with John Frazier, Jim Banich, Troy Haines and Mike Johnson.

The women’s teams of UCLA (3-1) and USC (12-0) will compete with the men for the first time to make it a double dual, with separate scoring. USC Coach Fred LaPlante sums up that competition as his team against versatile Jackie Joyner.

Joyner, the Olympic silver medalist in the heptathlon, could compete in as many as eight events, and her coach, Bob Kersee, when asked how many he might put her in, said facetiously: “Seventeen.”

Joyner’s possible events, with best 1985 marks in parentheses, are: 200 (24.06), 800 (2:18.19), high jump (6-0), long jump (20-8), 100-meter hurdles (13.68), 400 hurdles (57.27), shotput (44-3) and triple jump (41-6 1/2).

Women’s field events will begin at 11 a.m., men’s at 1 p.m.