3 Top All-Around Gymnasts to Compete in Pac-10 Meet

Three of the nation’s top male college gymnasts in the all-around will be featured in the Pacific 10 Conference Invitational at 7:30 p.m. Friday and at 1:30 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday at UCLA’s John Wooden Center.

Paul Linne of Arizona State, who averaged 57.1 in meets this season, is the nation’s fifth-ranked all-around performer. UCLA’s David Moriel is ranked 10th and Berkeley’s Bob Sundstrom, defending Pac-10 all-around champion, is 12th.

Teams include seventh-ranked UCLA, defending NCAA champion; No. 9 Stanford and No. 10 Arizona State, which won the NCAA title in 1986. Others are No. 13 Cal State Fullerton, No. 17 Berkeley and San Jose State and Washington.

The Bruins have won the Pac-10 invitational five times since 1980, including four straight times from 1981-84. Arizona State won the conference meet in 1985.

UCLA sophomore Jill Andrews, Pac-10 gymnast of the week, will lead the Bruins in the conference championships on Saturday at Arizona State in Tempe.

Last week Andrews led the top-ranked Bruins (11-0, 7-0 in conference action) to a victory over No. 2 Georgia. She set a school record of 38.65 in the all-around.

Shooting for its 33rd straight dual-meet victory under Coach Bob Larsen, the UCLA men’s track team (5-0), defending NCAA and Pac-10 champions, will play host to California on Saturday at Drake Stadium. The first field event is at 1 p.m. and first running event at 2. Last year the Bruins defeated Cal, 100 1/2-62 1/2, at Berkeley.

The No. 5 Pepperdine men’s tennis team (12-3) is seeded third in the Blue-Gray Tournament, today through Sunday at Montgomery, Ala.

The Waves will open against Alabama today. The winner will play Friday against the winner of the Southwest Louisiana-Trinity match. USC is the tourney’s top seed and Georgia is No. 2.

Pepperdine’s Robby Weiss and Andrew Sznadjer are ranked first and second nationally in singles. The Wave doubles team of Craig Johnson and Grant Saacks is rated third.

The No. 19 Pepperdine women (14-3 as the week began), paced in singles by No. 11 Ginger Helgeson and No. 18 Janna Kovacevich, will play their next three matches, at home at 1:30 p.m. The Waves will meet UC Santa Barbara on Saturday, Pacific on Monday and Harvard on Tuesday.

The No. 13 UCLA tennis team (12-4 overall, 2-0 in the Pac-10) will be on the road for conference rematches on Friday with Arizona and on Saturday with Arizona State.

Last Monday the Bruins lost to No. 9 Kentucky, 5-2. The only UCLA winners were Buff Farrow at No. 1 singles and Brian Garrow at No. 4.

Though the Bruins won at home against Arizona, 5-1, and Arizona State, 6-0, UCLA Coach Glenn Bassett said he expects the two “will be much tougher at home, especially since the Sun Devils upset No. 1 USC, 5-4, at Tempe last week.”

The No. 5 UCLA women (12-2, 2-1 in the Pac-10) will play host to top-ranked Stanford (13-1, 2-0) at 1 p.m. Friday and to No. 4 California (11-2, 1-0) at 1 p.m. Saturday at UCLA’s Los Angeles Tennis Center.

Bruin singles players, Maria LaFranchi is ranked 45th, Kirsten Dreyer 46th and Joni Urban 61st.

Pepperdine’s baseball team (13-14-1 overall and 2-1-1 in the West Coast Athletic Conference at the start of the week) will play a four-game conference series at home against the University of San Diego (15-14, 2-2) this weekend. There will be a 2:30 p.m. game on Friday, a noon double-header on Saturday (3-26) and a 1 p.m. game on Sunday.

The Waves also will play a road game at UC Santa Barbara at 2 p.m. Tuesday and a single game Wednesday at home at 2:30 p.m. with Cal Lutheran.

Pepperdine went 2-1-1 in its conference-opening series with Santa Clara last week. San Diego split four WCAC games with St. Mary’s.

The top-ranked UCLA women’s softball team will compete Friday through Sunday in the San Jose State Invitational. Others in the 20-team field include No. 9 Illinois State, No. 11 Arizona State, No. 12 Utah State, No. 13 Nebraska, No. 15 Northwestern, No. 17 Central Michigan and No. 19 Adelphi.

The Bruins will play host to Nevada Reno at 1 p.m. Tuesday and to Northwestern at 1 p.m. Wednesday.

Last week UCLA split a double header with Oregon and swept two from Oregon State. Bruin pitcher Lisa Longaker (9-1) has hurled 56 consecutive, scoreless innings.

The No. 6 Pepperdine men’s volleyball team (9-10 overall and 5-6 in the Western Intercollegiate Volleyball Assn.) will play host to Stanford at 7:30 p.m. Friday and to No. 5 UC Santa Barbara at 7:30 p.m. Saturday at Firestone Fieldhouse. The Waves will play No. 4 UCLA at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at Pauley Pavilion.

Catherine Capriles set three school swimming records and made All-American in the same three events as UCLA finished ninth with 153 points at last week’s NCAA championships at Austin, Tex. The University of Texas scored 661 points to win its fifth straight national title.

Capriles finished sixth in the 200-yard individual medley in 2:02.16, eighth in the 100 backstroke in 56.21 and 10th in the 200 backstroke in 1:58.96.