REALLY IN THE SWING : St. Paul Boys’ Golf Team’s Top Players Are Debbie, Gina

Debbie Koyama, these days no longer rating pioneer status for merely being a girl on a boys’ team, finds herself in an unwanted war of chauvinism nonetheless.

It’s not so much that she beats everyone in golf at St. Paul High School in Santa Fe Springs, and most of the other boys in the Angelus League for that matter, or that she plays No. 1 in the lineup with another girl, freshman Gina Gonzales, No. 2. It’s the way she does it--with proper golf etiquette and all the rules seemingly committed to memory.

Koyama’s teammates seem to accept her stature, which she has attained by finishing third in the Southern Section girls’ tournament last season and more recently by earning a scholarship to UCLA. But her discipline and approach to the game are other matters.

“I try to say things nicely and tell them the rules,” she said. “But the more I say, the more they hate me.”

“I’m a girl and they’re guys. They don’t want to hear me telling them anything.

“If a girl knows more about sports than a guy, it’s like a disgrace. Whenever I try to say something, they put me down. So I don’t say anything anymore.

“I wish they had the heart to listen. I don’t want to say anything, but I do know more about the game. I’ve been around it longer than all of them and I had to go through the same things they are now. I had to learn, too.”

Koyama has done most of her learning away from St. Paul where, she said, the lack of competition has brought down her game and whose coach, Marc Viens, admittedly is more manager-organizer than coach. Things were interesting for her there at first, especially with four-time league MVP Bobby Laskin, now a junior at UCLA, but the level soon fell as he and others graduated and no one was left to push her.

In the “outside world,” there are the league finals against the boys and Southern Section finals against the girls, which should be interesting since the top three finishers return. Beyond that, Koyama has the American Junior Golf Assn., with tournaments around the country.

A first-team All-American in 1986 as one of the top 10 point getters on the circuit, she won the Arizona Silver Bell in Scottsdale two summers ago, after her sophomore year, and this year finished ninth at The Woodlands, Tex., in April, but came back back to win at Abilene, Tex., in a playoff a week later.

The emergence of Gonzales, a 14-year-old whose brother Chris won the Foothill League individual title last season for Montebello Schurr, has provided something of a spark closer to home. For instance, Koyama shot 43 at California Country Club against Downey Pius X and Gonzales a 44. Koyama fired a 39 against Santa Ana Mater Dei at Candlewood and Gonzales had a 42. All that has gotten Gonzales, though, is recognition as a star of the future because, for now, Koyama has the spotlight to herself, and not just at St. Paul. Koyama was medalist nine times in the Swordsmen’s first 15 matches.

“A lot of other teams want to play Debbie out of respect because they knows she’s good,” Viens said. “Anybody who has been in the league two or three years knows Debbie is one of the leaders.”

For the same reason, a lot of people at St. Paul don’t want to play with her. She’s too good.

“I think people are more jealous about her ability,” said one teammate, James Hopper. “I don’t think people really hate her. People feel more intimidated by her.”

Is she intimidating?

“No,” Hopper said. “But her game is.”

And so is her intensity to the sport, at least in the eyes of the Swordsmen.

“Sometimes, Debbie is more like a professional adult and the kids are out there like high school kids,” Viens said. “We get to the ninth green, and they’re bouncing off the walls. But with her, it’s all very serious.

“They’re not nearly as serious as Debbie. They’re serious, but not on the same level. Some of them would rather mess around, and they know they can’t mess around with Debbie because she won’t stand for it. What kid wants to be in a classroom with a teacher who won’t let him mess around?”

Koyama, though, maintains her serious approach to golf.

“People wonder how I do it, how I play with the guys and hit far,” she said. “I’m a girl, so I tend not to think how far they hit. I just worry about how far I hit.”

Prep Notes

The 30-team Redondo-Mira Costa volleyball tournament, regarded as the top invitational in California, will be held today at both schools, with pool play beginning at 9 a.m. and the championship set for Redondo at about 6 p.m. Six of the top 10 teams from the latest Southern Section 4-A coaches’ poll, including 1-2-3 Newport Beach Newport Harbor, Manhattan Beach Mira Costa and Goleta Dos Pueblos, City standouts Palisades, L.A. University and Westchester and Poway of the San Diego Section, will be in the field. Seven of the top 10 from the Southern Section 3-A will also play, led by No. 1 L.A. Loyola. Palisades is the defending champion. . . . Steve Keith, who has won two Southern Section basketball titles at Glendale since 1981 and reached the playoffs eight times in the last 10 years, has been named coach at Irvine. . . . Dave Swanson of Mission Hills Alemany, with a best jump of 7 feet, has been added to the field for the open high jump in the Pepsi Invitational May 16 at UCLA. . . . Terri Mann of Point Loma was named girls’ basketball player of the year by USA Today and was the only Californian to make any of the first three teams.

With his three-week long hot streak at three California invitationals--Arcadia, Mt. Carmel and, last Saturday, Mt. San Antonio--Kamy Keshmiri of Reno has the 11 best discus throws on the national high school list. . . . The Woodland Hills El Camino Real softball team, its winning streak at a state-record 65, is down to one pitcher since Cari Silverman quit the team last week. She said she no longer enjoyed playing softball, adding that the decision had nothing to do with her sister Beth’s being dismissed from the team earlier this season. Sophomore Jodi Iwafuchi, who pitched a no-hitter Wednesday against Canoga Park, constitutes the Conquistadores’ pitching rotation. . . . The Simi Valley baseball team had its 21-game Marmonte League winning streak snapped Wednesday by Thousand Oaks, 4-0. It was the third loss of the season for the Pioneers, No. 2 in The Times’ SouthernSection rankings. . . . The latest Southern Section boys’ tennis poll has Santa Barbara leading the 5-A, Dana Hills the 4-A, Los Alamitos the 3-A, Placentia Valencia the 2-A and Santa Ynez the 1-A.