Community Service Leaves Imprint on Loyola

Fourteen MVPs (most valuable persons) returned full-time to Loyola High School in Los Angeles Monday, and just in time. The Cubs play for their first Del Rey League basketball title in 10 years tonight at Notre Dame of Sherman Oaks.

For nearly seven weeks, this has been a team without a routine. There was Christmas vacation, then senior exams, then the rest of the school took exams while the seniors had time off and then, perhaps the toughest of all, the senior projects.

The latter, a three-week, five-day-a-week community-service undertaking as a graduation requirement, was no ordinary assignment for the 14 seniors--9 players and 5 managers. Some, such as star forward George Jones, who leads the Cubs in scoring (18 points) and rebounding (10), went back to grammar school to help in the classroom and the yards.

Two others, starting point guard Jim West and backup Dennis Canning, were aides at the Shriners Hospital for Crippled Children in Los Angeles, where they befriended patients and transported some to therapy and lunch. One of the managers, Matt Brancale, spent his three weeks working at an orphanage in Mexico. In the eight years of the program, others have helped out at the Braille Institute and drug rehabilitation centers.

Because of it, they will be different people--and different players. Coach Bill Thomason knows because he has seen it before.

“When they first practice and play in a game, that’s when it starts to come out,” said Thomason, whose Cubs are 17-5 overall and 8-2 in the Del Rey League. “I’m sure it will be in the back of their minds. There will be an extra spring in their step. They’ll be quicker, and they will run harder. It’s like they know now they’re blessed with that ability after spending six hours a day with someone who can’t even walk.

“Tuesday night, it should be real evident. My last words to them before the game will probably be something about how lucky they are to be able to play, whether they win or lose. I’ll tell them they should be happy just to be able to play.”

Every senior at Loyola does the volunteer work, in addition to a less-intense requirement of 50 hours of community service during three months at some other time in high school, but it is especially different for the basketball team. First, there is the problem of practicing after spending six hours somewhere else--which usually is harder work than school itself, Thomason said--and then the immediate residual effect.

School administrators, who no doubt weren’t considering this notion when they started the give-something-back-to-the-community plan, probably don’t mind the correlation now. Not with the success.

“They (the patients) will still be in the back of my mind,” said West, who set the Loyola single-game and season assist records as a junior and has broken both in 1987-88. “I’ll be thinking about it. I can walk and they can’t. When you see certain things like that, it makes you want to work to your fullest potential. I know it makes me work a lot harder and realize what I have.”

Loyola’s losses: By one point in overtime during nonleague to St. Paul of Santa Fe Springs, No. 10 in The Times’ Southern Section rankings.

By four to Pasadena in the Bishop Amat Tournament.

By one in overtime to San Gorgonio of San Bernardino in the Bishop Amat Tournament.

By four to Bosco Tech of Rosemead in the Del Rey League.

By seven to Crespi of Encino last Friday in league.

That’s five losses, two of them in overtime, by 17 points. The Cubs, a fast-break team with one starter at 6 feet 9 inches but no one else over 6-5, also have a victory over No. 15 St. Bernard of Playa del Rey.

After going unbeaten in the Empire League last season, Katella of Anaheim has won only two games in 1987-88. That means the Knights will not be in the playoffs for the first time in 22 years, the longest such streak in Southern Section basketball history.

Even a 74-70 upset victory last Friday over El Dorado of Placentia couldn’t lift the spirits of Coach Tom Danley.

“It was like a sweater when you pull one string and the whole thing unravels,” Danley said. “I believe you have to play percentages, and you’re not going to win every game. But I didn’t expect the bottom to drop out so drastically.

“You know that, because of your track record, you have to be up for every game. When you have a down year, everyone has a score to settle.

“Maybe someone upstairs was trying to send a lesson in humility,” he said, laughing.

It probably worked. Katella is 6-14 overall.

Prep Notes

Ray Avesian, football coach at L.A. Wilson, has been elected president of the National Football Foundation’s Pasadena-San Gabriel Valley chapter. He replaces Jim Brownfield, athletic director and former football coach at Pasadena Muir. Brownfield becomes chairman of the board of directors. Among other things, the NFF puts on an all-star football game every summer in the San Gabriel Valley. . . . Pius X of Downey retired football jersey No. 25 Saturday in honor of Darrin Nelson, who played for the Warriors in 1975 and ’76 and went on to Stanford and the Minnesota Vikings. . . . Correction: Banning has the second-longest league win streak in Southern Section history, not Mater Dei of Santa Ana as reported recently. Banning, whose last loss in the Sunkist League was in 1983, extended its run to 73 games with wins over Notre Dame of Riverside and Temecula Valley last week. Santa Clara of Oxnard has the all-time record with 82 straight league victories, set from 1956-65, so the best Banning, the No. 7 team in The Times’ Southern Section rankings, can do is reach 75 before starting the playoffs next week and wait until next season to take on the record book. . . . Applications for the California Interscholastic Federation scholar-athlete of the year are available in high school counseling offices. One boy and one girl will be selected. Deadline for applying is March 25. . . . Beginning with the 1988 football season, offensive linemen will be allowed to fully extend their arms and use open hands while blocking, similar to what is allowed in college and the pros. This does not replace an old rule, just permits more.