Cerritos Accepts PONY Bid

Cerritos College has accepted the final berth in the PONY Bowl doubleheader, game manager Keith Calkins said Sunday.

Cerritos (6-3-1), third-place team in the South Coast Conference, will play Saddleback (8-2), the Mission Conference champion, at 1 p.m. Dec. 5. Taft (9-0), the top-ranked team in the state and nation, plays El Camino (10-0), the top-ranked team in Southern California and fourth in the nation, at 7 p.m. Both games are at Orange Coast College.

Taft won the Central Valley Conference championship; El Camino won the South Coast Conference title.

This will be the second time Cerritos and Saddleback have met in the PONY Bowl. Cerritos defeated Saddleback, 34-7, in the 1983 game.

Orange Coast was the first choice of the PONY Bowl committee last week, but OCC declined two invitations because the Pirates (8-2) had defeated Saddleback this season, and OCC Coach Bill Workman said his players weren’t interested in a rematch.

OCC lost a share of the Mission Conference title with a 36-26 loss to Citrus (3-7) Saturday.

Golden West (5-4-1) was also being considered but fell out of the running when the Rustlers lost to El Camino, 39-20, Saturday.