CLOSE-UP : Goalie Heaver Has CSUN Opponents Drawing a Blank

While Gary Wolfe was guarding the goal for Cal State Northridge’s conference-champion soccer team last season, Phil Heaver was kicking back in Santa Monica honing his tennis and karate skills.

This season, Wolfe is watching from the bench as Heaver tends to CSUN’s goalkeeping. A highly touted junior college transfer, Heaver, 21, won the starting position over Wolfe and two other candidates.

He didn’t play last season, but that hasn’t hampered the Miami native. After a 2-1 scrimmage loss to UCLA on Aug. 24, CSUN has shut out three straight opponents.

“I’m so happy we got him,” CSUN Coach Marwan Ass’ad said. “Last year he wanted to come to CSUN, but a restaurant-management class he took was nontransferable. So, he went to Santa Monica College.”

Heaver’s nontransferable class was from Glendale College, where he earned JC All-American honors as a freshman goalkeeper. After the 1983 season, he moved to Santa Monica, where, he said, “I worked out a lot, but I didn’t play soccer. I played a lot of tennis, did karate and some sky diving.”

It didn’t take Heaver long to jump into the Matadors’ starting lineup. Ass’ad was impressed with his speed and intelligence, and even though he dislocated a finger against the Bruins, Heaver has remained in the crease.

“He’s a soccer goalie, period,” Ass’ad said. “We just taped up his finger, and he’s played great. He’s a complete soccer maniac, and that’s hard to find in America.”

But they’re not too hard to find in the south of England, where the former Beverly Hills High soccer MVP spent six years playing soccer as a youth.

“My family moved around a lot when I was a kid,” he said. “I lived in East Bourne, England, and they play a lot of soccer there. That’s really where I learned how to play.”

It wasn’t until Heaver was 15, however, that he learned to tend goal. “We were playing in a game and our goalie got hurt,” he said. “They put me in and I’ve been a goalie ever since.”

And he has played well enough to pass Wolfe, who was the goalie for CSUN’s 1984 California Collegiate Athletic Assn. champion.

Is there anomosity among the goalkeepers? “Oh no, not at all,” Heaver said. “All the goalkeepers are in the same boat. All the goalies on this team are very good friends. I’ve even played against (reserve goalie) Mark Grody before in a youth league and we’re friends.

“I don’t think there any hard feelings. And, anyway, if I mess up, one of those guys will come in and take my place.”