SportsScope : 7th-Rated Waves Water Polo Team Opens PCAA Play

Pepperdine’s water polo team, ranked seventh nationally in a coaches poll, will begin play in the Pacific Coast Athletic Assn. at home this weekend, meeting Cal State Fullerton (4-7) at 1:30 p.m. Saturday and No. 8 UC Irvine (6-3 and 2-0 in league) at 1:30 p.m. Sunday. Irvine is the defending PCAA champion.

Coach Terry Schroeder’s Waves (10-6) posted a 3-2 mark last week in the Eastern Invitational Tournament at Brown. Pepperdine lost the opener to Brown, then defeated Navy, Harvard and Bucknell and lost the final, 12-10, to No. 1 Stanford, defending NCAA champion.

Schroeder, whose team will play its first five conference matches at home, said, “If we play consistently this weekend, the team has a good chance to be 2-0 in conference play.

“I think we learned quite a bit about our team at the Brown tournament. The conference race should be quite close, and I think there are several teams capable of winning the title and advancing to the NCAA tournament.”

The Santa Monica College football team won another hair-raiser last week, coming back from an 18-0 deficit to edge Compton, 32-31.

The Corsairs, 3-0 and ranked seventh in the state by the JC Athletic Bureau, won’t find things easier when they open Western State Conference play at 1:30 p.m. Saturday at Glendale College, ranked No. 4 in the state. Glendale is 3-0 and defending WSC co-champion with Moorpark.

Compton quarterback Lance Salters passed, ran and kicked well enough to give the Tartars a victory. Compton led 18-0 before SMC quarterback Kevin Bray started moving his team.

Salters passed for a touchdown, ran for two and kicked a 24-yard field goal. His five-yard scoring run in the third period put Compton back in the lead, 24-19, and he threw an eight-yard, fourth-quarter touchdown to give the Tartars the lead again, 31-25.

But Bray, who didn’t complete a pass till halfway through the second quarter, hit wide receiver Demetrius (Pee Wee) Smith with a short pass and Smith turned it into a 70-yard touchdown that tied it, 31-31. Alan McGavin’s kick made it 32-31.

Bray finished with 22 completions in 39 attempts for a career-high 405 yards and two touchdowns. Corsair running back Ken Williams scored on two short runs.

Glendale Coach Jim Sartoris’ Vaqueros have defeated El Camino and Los Angeles Valley and last week downed Pasadena, 13-8. The Vaqueros defeated SMC, 21-17, last year in the last two minutes.

Quarterback Rob Huffman, who last year passed for 1,533 yards and 12 touchdowns, heads Glendale. Other veterans are running back Kevin Sterling, who rushed for 812 yards and scored 14 touchdowns in conference play, and wide receiver Douglas Hooker.

The UCLA men’s soccer team, which extended its school-record unbeaten streak to 26 matches by capturing the Pac-10 Conference Tournament last week, will try to make it 27 at Fresno State at 2 p.m. Sunday at Bulldog Stadium.

The Bruins, ranked fourth nationally and first in the Far West, raised their record to 5-0-3 in the Pac-10 tourney by defeating Stanford, 2-0, and Cal, 2-1.

Fresno State, coming off a 1-0 win over Nevada Las Vegas, is the last team to defeat Coach Sigi Schmid’s Bruins, beating UCLA, 2-1, last year. The Fresno Bulldogs, ranked second in the Far West, trail in the series with the Bruins, 6-3-1.

The UCLA women’s volleyball team, which gave Coach Andy Banachowski his 500th career victory in splitting two matches with No. 8 Texas last week, will be at No. 10 UC Santa Barbara for a non-conference match at 8 p.m. Friday.

The Bruins, ranked fifth in the nation in the coaches’ poll, also won road matches last week at Oregon and Oregon State to raise their record to 11-3 overall and 6-0 in the Pac-10 Conference. In the four matches, UCLA junior outside hitter Lori Zeno led the attack with 59 kills and a .365 hitting percentage.

Last week UCSB lost two matches at Hawaii and dropped to 9-2 overall. UCLA leads the series, 47-5.

The Pepperdine women’s volleyball team, ranked 15th nationally by the Collegiate Volleyball Coaches Assn. and tied for 10th with Texas in the NCAA coaches poll, will be at USC at 2 p.m. Saturday and at UC Santa Barbara at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday.

Last week Coach Nina Matthies’ Waves lost to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo but won West Coast Athletic Conference openers with USF and Santa Clara to go 6-3 overall and 2-0 in the WCAC.

Pepperdine junior outside hitter Julie Evans leads the team with 149 kills (4.8 a game), a .315 hitting average and 67 digs. Last week Lisa Bevington, Wave sophomore middle blocker, registered 25 kills and a .415 hitting average in the three matches.

The UCLA men’s and women’s cross-country teams will compete Saturday in the 13th annual Stanford Invitational, generally the West Coast’s top meet.

Defending Pac-10 Conference champion Stanford, paced by Pac-10 individual champion Marc Olesen, is favored. Coach Bob Larsen’s Bruins are led by senior Mark Junkermann, who has won both meets he has run in this year. Junkermann turned in an 18:53.69 over four miles at the UCLA All-Comers Meet and a 30:27 10,000 meters at the Fresno State Invitational.

In women’s competition, the top teams are North Carolina State, the NCAA’s third-place team last year, and Brigham Young, which finished ninth in the nation.

Santa Monica College harriers Pat Story, Midge Arteaga and Patty Almendariz finished one-two-three and all broke the course record of 20:34 as the Corsairs defeated Santa Barbara and Ventura in a Western State Conference triangular at Ventura. The point totals were SMC 34, Santa Barbara 53 and Ventura 54.

Story ran the three miles in 20:21, Arteaga in 20:28 and Almendariz in 20:32.

The four-mile men’s competition was won by Ventura with 33 points. Santa Barbara was second with 43 and SMC third with 52. Alfredo Perez led the Corsairs by finishing third and teammate Dave Wallace was fifth.

The Corsair men and women, idle this weekend, will play host to WSC rivals Bakersfield, Oxnard and Pierce on Oct. 10 at Will Rogers State Park.