SportsScope : Clippers to Take on Golden State Warriors in Annual Charity Game at Cal Poly

The Los Angeles Clippers will be playing for charity when they face the Golden State Warriors in a National Basketball Assn. exhibition at 7:30 p.m. Saturday at Cal Poly Pomona’s Kellogg Gym.

Proceeds will be shared by the Casa Colina Hospital Wheelchair Sports Program and Cal Poly’s athletic grant-in-aid fund.

It is the third straight year that the Clippers have played an exhibition at Kellogg. The Clippers are using Cal Poly as their training camp for the second year in a row.

The Clippers feature center Benoit Benjamin, guard Marques Johnson and forward Cedric Maxwell, and Golden State is led by high-scoring forward Pervis Short, center Joe Barry Carroll and guard Chris Mullin. Golden State also has forward Greg Ballard, who starred at Garey High in Pomona.

Saturday’s game is the pre-season opener for the Clippers, who have been holding two-a-day practices at Kellogg since Oct. 3 and will train there through Sunday. The team’s evening practices, usually from 6 to 8, are public.

Tickets for Saturday’s game, $7, are available by calling the Cal Poly ticket office at (714) 869-2810 or 869-2815. Tickets are also available at the gym starting at 5:30 p.m. Saturday.

Players from both teams will sign autographs from 6:15 p.m. to 6:40 p.m. Saturday at the gym. Game officials are hoping to match last year’s sellout crowd of 4,765.

It will be the Battle of the Polys when Cal Poly Pomona and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo--two of the top men’s cross-country teams in NCAA Division II--compete in a five-mile dual meet at 10 a.m. Saturday at Pomona.

Pomona Coach Jim Sackett is hoping the meet will help establish a rivalry between the schools. “It’s all in the spirit of good, friendly competition and will get the guys excited about the individual rivalry,” he said.

“Of course it will be a team race, but more than that it will pit the No. 1 runners from each university, and so on down the line through 10 runners.”

If last week’s Stanford Invitational is an indication, it should be close. Pomona finished eighth in the 30-team Stanford meet--first among Division II teams--with 233 points, and San Luis Obispo was ninth with 249. North Carolina State won with 85.

Pomona was led by Angel Roman, who finished 32nd with a 10-K time of 32:01.0, and Abel Mota, who was 33rd in 32:02.4. Another standout is Eddie Toro, although he placed 39th in 32:06.3 at Stanford.

“We ran well through the three-mile point,” Sackett said. “Toro didn’t run a sharp race, which decreased our chances of placing in the top five.”

The Cal Poly Pomona women’s cross-country team, considered among the best in NCAA Division II, will meet another of the top teams on the West Coast when it faces UC Davis in the Davis Invitational 5-K at 10 a.m. Saturday.

Pomona will be without its top runner, senior Joann Howard, who will be taking a graduate test.

“This weekend would have been a good contest between Davis and ourselves,” Bronco Coach John Turek said. “But we will be minus Howard. Our performance will be greatly hindered. . . . Davis is always one of the key opponents in making it to the nationals, and it is in the picture again this year.”

With Howard leading the way, Pomona finished 12th with 379 points in the 30-team Stanford Invitational last week. Howard, the school record holder in the 5-K, finished 16th in 17:29.5

The team is expected to be led Saturday by Sherrie Roach, Trisha Molina and Karen Farley.

Not many water polo teams have played as difficult a schedule as Cal State Los Angeles.

How many others have played 12 of their first 13 games against teams ranked in the NCAA top 20?

That is the biggest reason why the Eagles have a 4-11 record heading into their match against yet another top-20 team, 13th-ranked UC San Diego, at 4 p.m. Friday at San Diego.

They collided in the National Invitational Tournament final last year and San Diego won, 16-6.

Cal State Coach Mike Santo, whose team is ranked No. 18 in the nation, expects a close game. “It’s going to be a very good game. We’ll be up for it, but I know UC San Diego will also be.”

The Golden Eagles, who defeated Pomona-Pitzer and Whittier last week, are led on offense by Joao B. Meirelles, Charles Sommer and Brexon Nichols. Sommer is the leading scorer with 20 goals.

Two nationally ranked NCAA Division II women’s volleyball teams will square off when Cal State Los Angeles hosts Cal Poly Pomona in a California Collegiate Athletic Assn. match at 7:30 p.m. tonight.

Pomona was ranked No. 10 in Division II with a 7-7 record and Cal State No. 12 with an 11-6 mark entering this week’s play. Cal State lost its CCAA opener to top-ranked Cal State Northridge in four games last week while Pomona dropped its opener to fourth-ranked UC Riverside in three games.