The Colleges : Occidental ‘Gumbys’ Will Not Take Bench Role Sitting Down

For many basketball players, the humiliation of spending a game on the bench is the modern-day equivalent of spending an afternoon in Puritan stocks. But to the “Gumbys,” a group of seldom-used Occidental players, their fraternity is an elite one.

“We’re called the Gumbys because we’re the biggest stiffs around,” senior Tony Berlin mused.

So stiff, in fact, that they rarely sit.

In a game against La Verne, the group vowed to remain standing until the Tigers built a 10-point lead. To everyone’s relief, Occidental opened with a 10-0 run.

Keith Berglund says that the group is constantly being reprimanded by agitated referees.

“They’ll come by and say, ‘Sit down, guys,’ and we’ll sit down and bounce up two seconds later,” Berglund said. “It’s like the NFL spike rule--it has to be spontaneous standing.”

When he watches college games on television, Berglund pays close attention to what’s happening on the bench.

“I try to pick up pointers,” he said. “For instance, they have certain handshakes for certain things.”

Even the Gumbys have a social barriers, however.

“You don’t want to get caught beyond the water cooler,” Berglund said. “That’s no-man’s-land. You’re the bench person from hell. You’re gone.”

Playing patiently: The Master’s College basketball team has played well recently, but it still has been victimized by lack of experience.

Tuesday night at Biola, the Mustangs held a 54-51 lead with 3:33 left before committing 2 turnovers and losing, 66-60.

The loss to Biola came on the heels of a win over Bethany Bible sandwiched between a 67-64 loss to Fresno Pacific and an 80-72 overtime loss to Christian Heritage.

Before the season, Master’s Coach Mel Hankinson said that his players would have to grow up fast. Now that they’ve proven they can compete, Hankinson said there is a tendency for the players--and coaches--to become impatient.

“If you’re losing games by 20 with freshmen, you say, ‘That’s OK, our time will come,’ ” Hankinson said. “But when you start losing by one or two points, you want to say, ‘Hurry up and start playing like juniors.’ ”

Tonight, the Mustangs (10-10 overall, 5-7 in NAIA District 3) will get another stiff test when they travel to Arizona to play Grand Canyon, the defending NAIA national champion.

On the move: Ronnie Lopez, who once said that he would “establish the Pierce football team,” enrolled for the spring semester at Glendale on Tuesday.

Lopez, who was selected player of the year after leading Franklin High to a 1987 City Section 3-A Division championship, started at quarterback for Pierce last season.

As for establishing the team, the Brahmas finished 1-9 and Lopez completed 66 of 163 passes for 921 yards and 6 touchdowns and threw 9 interceptions.

Lopez, who reckons he might have better luck with a more established program, said that he is “99 percent” committed to playing football for the Vaqueros.

His body may say otherwise. Lopez was constantly pummeled by defensive players and he watched the conclusion of many plays from a ground-level view. He underwent surgery Dec. 28 to repair torn ligaments in his right shoulder. Although he is in therapy, Lopez says that he will not be able to throw a ball until June.

Sid Stark, the Glendale quarterback coach, says that Lopez will have a battle if he wants to play next season.

“Darren Fitzgerald is definitely our No. 1 guy right now,” Stark said.

Coming home: Marwan Ass’ad, soccer coach at Cal State Northridge, returned last week from an 18-day visit to Israel ready to begin preparations for next season.

“They offered me a contract to stay and coach,” said Ass’ad, who grew up in Nazareth. “I said, ‘No way. I’m going home.’ ”

On Tuesday, Ass’ad and the Matadors will begin their quest for California Collegiate Athletic Assn. championship No. 6. The Matadors won’t begin competition until next September, but Ass’ad has always maintained that the key to success for CSUN is spring workouts.

“This is where they learn how to play the game a little bit,” Ass’ad said.

Meanwhile, Ass’ad will continue to recruit. Thus far, he has found a plethora of talented--albeit smallish--prospects in the Valley area.

“All the great players out there are under 150 pounds,” Ass’ad observed. “We would like to have some muscle to knock heads.”

Conference cut: The California Collegiate Athletic Assn., of which Northridge is a member, got a little smaller last week when Chapman College announced that it was dropping men’s and women’s track, men’s and women’s cross-country, men’s volleyball and women’s tennis at the conclusion of the school year.

Bone to pick: San Luis Obispo fans are considered among the best in the CCAA. They are loud, easily excitable and, apparently, have a sense of humor.

When Todd Bowser, CSUN’s 6-foot-8, 280-pound center, was introduced before last Saturday’s basketball game at Mott gym, a fan slid a box onto the floor that came to a stop near the player’s feet.

It was filled with Butcher Bone dog biscuits.

“That was great,” Bowser said after CSUN won the game, 72-63. “I hope they saved that for me.”

Area code: Cal State Bakersfield has the only basketball team in the CCAA with a starting lineup consisting entirely of out-of-state players. Against Northridge last Thursday, the Roadrunners started 3 players from Oklahoma and 2 from Arizona.

Of Bakersfield’s 11 players, only 2 are from California--forwards Beau Redstone of Bakersfield and Philip Averbuck from Sebastopol.

Staff writers Sam Farmer, Gary Klein, Mike Hiserman and Ralph Nichols contributed to this notebook.