SportsScope : Loyola Rises to 4th in Baseball Ranks With Hot Bats and Stingy Pitching

Loyola Marymount University, up to fourth in the national Collegiate Baseball ratings, takes a 29-6 record and 12-game winning streak into a three-game nonconference series this weekend at home against Sacramento State. The Lions will play a 2:30 p.m. game Friday and a noon double-header Saturday. They play at UCLA at 2:30 p.m. Tuesday before returning to West Coast Athletic Conference games where they are 10-1 and lead Pepperdine by one game.

The Lions have scored in double figures in six straight games and seven of the last nine to raise their team batting average to .304. Hottest hitters are outfielder Jim Holleran and Todd Elliott. Holleran has had 22 hits in his last 51 at-bats, raising his average to .343 to go with 25 runs batted in. Freshman first baseman Elliott is batting .367 with 20 RBI in 16 games. He’s 9 for 19 in April. The team’s big guns are also hitting: Outfielder Billy Bean is up to .343 with 29 RBI, and third baseman Chris Donnels is at .344 with 8 home runs and 44 RBI.

Pitchers Mark Stomp and Tim Layana are shooting for school victory records. Stomp (10-1, 3.47 earned-run average) is one victory shy of Rod Volk’s season record of 11 that has stood since 1973, the last time Loyola won a conference title. Layana (9-2, 3.99) is also within range of Volk and needs one victory to tie Jim Kerker’s career record of 28, which has stood since 1969.

Cal State Dominguez Hills will try to maintain its lead in the California Collegiate Athletic Assn. baseball race when it plays five games in five days, starting Friday with a three-game home series against Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. The Toros, who hold a half-game lead, play a single game at 2:30 p.m. Friday, then a noon double-header Saturday. They travel to UC Riverside on Monday before returning home to play Cal Poly Pomona on Tuesday.

The Toros were 19-10-1 overall and 7-3 in the CCAA after Tuesday’s 7-2 loss to second-place Cal State Los Angeles. San Luis Obispo is in last place at 2-8, while Riverside is fifth at 3-4 and Pomona is third at 6-4. The Toros are 10-1 at home.

Junior outfielder Jon Beuder is pacing the Toros in batting (.370) and runs batted in (29). He carried a 10-game hitting streak into the week and had hit safely in 25 of the Toros’ 29 games. Pitcher Jim Pena, returning to form after a slow start, had a 5-hit, 11-strikeout victory over UC Riverside last week to improve his record to 5-1 (3-0 in CCAA) and give him 225 career strikeouts, a school record.

Redondo High has risen to second in the CIF 4-A baseball coaches ratings while Mira Costa has dropped to fifth in boys 4-A volleyball. Redondo was ranked third last week and now trails only Simi Valley, tabbed by one national publication the nation’s top prep team. Mira Costa, top-ranked last week, fell to fifth in volleyball while Newport Harbor took over the top spot and Santa Monica moved into second. Bishop Montgomery is ranked seventh in 3-A. In boys 4-A tennis, Miraleste remains in the No. 2.

A Southland team of long-distance swimmers 75 and older, including two from the South Bay, recently set a national record in the National Postal One-Hour Championships in Washington, D. C. The foursome--John Burnside of Palos Verdes Estates, Alfred Guth of San Pedro, Leonard Chapin of Long Beach and Art Welch of Seal Beach, combined to swim 8,905 yards in an hour, beating the 4-year-old record by more than 150 yards. Burnside and Guth swim for the Cabrillo Beach Polar Bears.