Dominguez Will Host Weekend Soccer, Volleyball Tournaments

It’s tournament time this weekend at Cal State Dominguez Hills, where the athletic department is doubling its fun, acting as host for a four-team women’s soccer invitational as well as a 10-team women’s volleyball free-for-all.

The second annual Lady Toro Cup, with soccer double-headers Saturday and Sunday, is especially important for Dominguez Hills, which has designs on reaching the first-ever Division II playoffs but has gotten off to a slow start at 1-1-1.

The Lady Toros enter their tournament ranked sixth in the West. Their loss came to Cal State Hayward, the West’s top-rated team. The other tournament teams are Sonoma State, No. 2 in the West, No. 3 UC Davis and unrated but capable Cal Poly Pomona. So the Lady Toros can make up some ground with a good showing.

Saturday’s games pit Sonoma vs. Pomona at 11 a.m. and Dominguez Hills vs. Davis at 1 p.m. On Sunday, Pomona plays Davis at noon and the Toros face Sonoma at 2.

The Lady Toros have a 17-game home winning streak going back to October, 1986. Junior forward Lynor Johnson, who played goalie last year, leads the attack with four goals and one assist but injured her left shoulder last week and will miss the tournament. The Toros’ other goals belong to Kristi White (two) and Conni Cowman (one). Rhonda McVicar is the assist leader with two. Freshman goalie Lisa Gonzales has allowed five goals in three games.

The field is equally prestigious in the volleyball tournament, although the Lady Toros don’t figure to be one of the favorites. The lineup includes Cal State Sacramento, the top-rated women’s team in Division II; No. 2 Cal State Northridge, the defending national champion; No. 9 Regis College of Denver, plus Cal Baptist, West Texas State, Cal State Bakersfield, Cal State L.A., UC Davis and Eastern New Mexico.

The 10 teams will be split into five-team pools, with each team playing four matches within its pool. Pool matches are scheduled for 4, 6 and 8 p.m. Friday and 10 a.m. and noon Saturday. The top teams will advance to playoffs at 2 p.m., with the championship set for 4 p.m.

The Lady Toros, 0-2, are struggling after several players were found academically ineligible. Coach Jennifer Gorecki is waiting for a transfer to become eligible. Meanwhile, she has only seven or eight players. The Lady Toros will play Bakersfield at 4 and Davis at 8 p.m. Friday and Cal State L.A. and Eastern New Mexico at 10 a.m. and noon Saturday.

New Loyola Marymount baseball Coach Chris Smith beat the bushes over the summer for pitchers and feels he came up with several good ones. But due to a new NCAA rule, he won’t be sure what his talent looks like for another month.

This year, baseball coaches aren’t allowed to work with their players until the fall season officially begins Oct. 10. So for Smith, this is a pins-and-needles period.

Not only is this a transitional period for Smith and his new staff, he will also be looking to fill holes at several key positions that have not been open for years.

Smith is particularly high on junior right-hander Joe Caruso, who was drafted by the Texas Rangers. He also has added left-hander John Willard and righty Jon Degennaro to a staff that returns Steve Surico and Mike McNary, the Lions’ top winners last spring, and relief ace Darryl Scott.

Smith also added transfer Joe Bellezzo, the leading hitter at Nevada-Las Vegas last season, to a catching corps that returns all-league choice Miah Bradbury and Mark Grafitti.

Things are less settled in the infield, where Carl Fraticelli and Bobby DeJardin were the keystone combination for the last three years, and third base belonged to Chris Donnels and Don Sparks, the Lions’ leading hitters.

All of which means Smith is antsy to get going now--but can’t.

“This is a big fall for me ‘cause I have new coaches and some big decisions to make in the infield,” he said. “It should be real interesting. It is kind of a crapshoot, with several positions open that have been filled for a long time. I’d like to know who our shortstop is going to be. Our No. 1 and 2 hitters, I’m a little mystified whom they’re going to be. There’s gonna be a lot of battles.”

Smith takes over a traditionally heavy-hitting team that has been to the NCAA Regionals twice in the last three years. His early impression is the Lions “are not gonna be very fast, but I think we’ll be pretty physical. To get back to Omaha (College World Series), you’ve got to be physical.”

David Kato will join Smith’s staff as a part-time baseball coach at Loyola. Kato, 25, has been a scout for the Oakland Athletics for the past year. He’ll coach outfielders and catchers and will handle base-running instruction. Kato, who got his bachelor’s degree and teaching certificate at Cal State Fullerton, will work on his master’s in education at Loyola.

The new baseball coach at Cal State Dominguez Hills, George Wing, has two new assistants--David Trussell, who will handle the pitchers, and Mike Garcia, who will instruct the position players. Both were on Wing’s staff at Cosumnes River Community College.

Another coach new to the Dominguez Hills staff is Angel Wells, who will be an assistant with the women’s basketball team. Wells played for the Lady Toros last season, leading the team in scoring with a 10.8-point average.

College Notes

Good news for the Loyola Marymount basketball team: guard Enoch Simmons has returned for his senior season. Simmons, who signed with the Oakland A’s last June and spent the summer playing rookie league baseball, is allowed to play basketball under NCAA rules but as a professional athlete can no longer be on scholarship. Simmons will be Coach Paul Westhead’s only four-year veteran . . . Julie Jamile of Santa Clara was named the first West Coast Athletic Conference volleyball Player of the Week. The sophomore setter out of Torrance High played on a sprained ankle but earned all-tournament honors in a tournament at Fresno State, averaging nine assists and four digs per game . . . Mike Rudberg, an occasional starter for the Cal State Dominguez Hills basketball team, has left the team. The 6-5 junior forward cited family problems . . . Two former Mira Costa High volleyball stars are coaches this season: Wendy Fletcher, who played at UCLA, is a graduate assistant at her alma mater, and LeValley Pattison, who starred at El Camino College and graduated from Long Beach State, is the assistant coach at Pepperdine . . . According to the West Coast Athletic Conference, Loyola Marymount has the youngest volleyball team in the WCAC, with two seniors, two juniors, three sophomores and six freshmen. Pepperdine has the most veteran team, with five seniors and three juniors . . . The WCAC has four volleyball players from Alaska: Gonzaga’s Erica Cordy from Palmer, Portland’s Christy Martin from Sitka, San Diego’s Angie Rais from Anchorage and St. Mary’s Tracie Hajduckovich from Fairbanks.

-30-