Monroe Regains Respectability as City Finalist

When Kevin Campbell enters Dodger Stadium tonight to coach his team against San Fernando High in the City Section 4-A Division baseball championship game, it will mark the end of a long journey from his embarrassing start at Monroe High three years ago. Memories of his debut in the Mid-Valley League still make him shudder.

Campbell was fresh out of Cal State Northridge, a 25-year-old rookie coach eager to impress. Monroe’s first opponent was Granada Hills, the defending City champion coached by Darryl Stroh, whose teams have won five City baseball titles. To Campbell, who grew up in the Valley and played at Sylmar, Stroh represented the local coaching establishment.

Campbell fretted over the condition of his field. “If a field looks good, it says something about your program,” he reasoned.

By the time Granada Hills arrived, what his field said was “Help, I’m drowning.”

Campbell dislodged a sprinkler head while watering the infield, which had the same effect as when the fire department opens a hydrant onto a city street. By the time a soaking and red-faced Campbell plugged the geyser, his field looked like a rice paddy.

“I was rushing around like a madman and there was water everywhere. Both dugouts were flooded and the coaching boxes were swamped. It was humiliating, a nightmare,” he said.

Campbell’s bad dream grew worse when Granada Hills splashed nine runs across the plate in the first inning and further rained on Campbell’s day, 16-2.

Campbell tells the story with good humor because, for what seems like the first time in years, the joke is not on Monroe. The Vikings, who had virtually disappeared from the Valley scene in the major sports of football, basketball and baseball, have emerged as the City’s surprise team of 1988.

Not since the glory days of the early 1970s, when Monroe frequently challenged for City titles in numerous sports, have the Vikings gained so much attention. Rarely has a school benefited so much from a four-game win streak.

After struggling to a 5-10 Mid-Valley record, including losses in their last two regular-season games, the Vikings needed a 13-4 win over Birmingham in a tiebreaker game to qualify for the playoffs for the first time in four years. A 4-2 win over second-seeded Poly, followed by a 5-4 victory over Banning, both in eight innings, sent Monroe hurtling toward the semifinals and a match-up with defending champion Canoga Park.

Monroe’s magic worked again: The Vikings bumped off Canoga Park, 9-7, to reach the final for the first time since 1976.

Monroe (12-16) brings a losing record to tonight’s final and sends a sophomore, Sean Henson, to the mound in quest of the school’s first baseball championship since 1974. Still, the Vikings won’t content themselves with a token appearance.

“Even yesterday, I was thinking I just wanted to get to Dodger Stadium,” junior first baseman Tim Costic said. “But now I’ll be disappointed if we don’t win. I think we can and will win.”

Costic, Henson and senior shortstop Brian Eldridge have fueled Monroe’s drive to the final. Henson, who missed the first half of the season because of academic ineligibility, is 3-4 with two postseason wins. Costic, a left-hander, has two wins and a save and has knocked in seven runs in the past three games. He is batting .433 and has 35 runs batted in and 19 extra-base hits, including 5 home runs. Eldridge has raised his average to .495, hitting safely in 24 of his past 35 at-bats.

A makeshift lineup got San Fernando into the City baseball final. See related story, Page 15.