SportsSCOPE : Bruin Women Gymnasts Are the Best Bet for NCAA Crown After Regionals

The UCLA women’s gymnastics team is the top seed in the NCAA championships on Friday and Saturday at the University of Georgia at Athens. Team and individual all-around competition will be held Friday and individual events on Saturday. The Bruins, 23-1 and a loser only to Nebraska this season, earned the top seed by winning the West Regionals two weeks ago with a score of 193.25, which was added to its earlier NCAA-qualifying score.

UCLA will compete in the evening section with defending national champion Alabama, Utah, Nebraska, Georgia and Cal State Fullerton. Teams in the morning division are Florida, Oregon State, Oklahoma, Arizona State, Arizona and Ohio State.

Bruin Coach Jerry Tomlinson said he expects this to be “the most competitive meet the NCAA has ever seen due to the parity of the teams. There will be no room for mistakes.”

Tanya Service, Kim Hamilton and Jill Andrews lead the Bruins. Service is the nation’s top all-arounder, Hamilton is two-time defending NCAA floor exercise champion and Andrews won last year’s NCAA vault title. Hamilton is attempting to become the first gymnast to win three straight individual national championships.

The nationally top-ranked UCLA men’s volleyball team (24-3 overall and 14-1 in the Western Intercollegiate Volleyball Assn., will play a home-and-home series with No. 2 Stanford this week and next.

The Bruins will play Saturday at Stanford (15-2, 13-2) and play host to the Cardinal at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at Pauley Pavilion. If UCLA wins one of the two it will be assured of a tie for the WIVA title.

Last week All-American Trevor Schirman led the Bruins to the championship of UC Santa Barbara’s Clash of the Titans tournament. UCLA defeated No. 4 USC in four games and No. 6 Santa Barbara in three, and Schirman was named the most valuable player after he had 44 kills, 10 blocks and 13 digs in the two matches.

A winner of 14 straight matches, the No. 1 UCLA men’s tennis team (21-1 overall and 7-0 in the Pacific 10 Conference) will play at 1 p.m. Saturday at USC (16-8, 6-1 as the week began). The Trojans are tied with Miami of Florida for the nation’s No. 10 spot.

Last week the Bruins, who have lost only to South Carolina, swept No. 7 Stanford and No. 2 California.

Against Cal, the UCLA doubles team of Brian Garrow and Patrick Galbraith improved their record to 15-0 by upsetting top-ranked Woody Hunt and Ted Scherman, 6-3, 6-4. All-American Garrow returned to the UCLA top singles spot and won both his weekend matches, improving to 16-4.

The No. 4 UCLA women’s tennis team (16-3, 5-2 in the Pac-10) will play host to No. 11 Brigham Young (18-5) at 1 p.m. Friday and to No. 3 USC (14-3, 4-2) at 1 p.m. Saturday at the Los Angeles Tennis Center on campus.

Last week the Bruins defeated No. 6 California, 5-4, but lost to No. 1 Stanford, 5-1. Jessica Emmons, ranked eighth in the nation in singles, was the only UCLA winner against the Cardinal. She defeated Sandra Birch, 6-3, 6-4, improving to 17-1 at the top singles spot and 22-5 overall.

The No. 12 Pepperdine men’s tennis team (12-8) will try to improve its chances for a berth in the NCAA championships when it plays host to the University of San Diego, ranked 15th, on Sunday.

Last week the Waves lost to No. 5 UC Irvine, 5-1. San Diego recently upset No. 2 Cal.

Pepperdine will play host to UC Santa Barbara at 1:30 p.m. Monday and to No. 20 Cal State Long Beach at 1:30 p.m. Wednesday.

The Santa Monica College women’s tennis team (10-3 overall, 8-3 in the WSC as the week started) has a bye today.

Last week the Corsairs shut out Moorpark, 9-0, and defeated Bakersfield, 7-2.

The UCLA men’s and women’s track teams will play host to Louisiana State and Houston on Saturday at Drake Stadium. In a meet that will have triangular and dual scoring, women’s field events will start at 11:30 a.m. and men’s at 1:15 p.m. The first women’s run is at 1:30 and the men’s at 2.

The Bruin men are 3-0 in dual meets this season and have won 41 straight in the last three seasons.

In a non-scoring event with George Mason and the Mazda Track Club at Gainesville, Fla., last week, the Bruins were led by Michael Marsh, Brian Blutreich and David Wilson.

Marsh ran his first 100-meter dash of the season and finished second in 10.07, a school record. Florida’s Dennis Mitchell won in 10:06, best time in the world this season. Marsh won the 200 in 20:42, a world-best mark this season, but he hurt his knee at the end and may not compete Saturday.

Blutreich won the discus with a personal-best throw of 195 feet and was second in the shot put at 59-10 1/4. Wilson won the hammer with a season-best 212-6 and the shot at 60-3.

At the Florida Invitational, UCLA sophomore Tracie Millet was a triple winner, taking the shot at 48-1 3/4, the discus at 175-2 and the javelin at 149-3.

At Cal State Northridge, Bruins Janeene Vickers and Michele Wooton did well. Vickers won the 100 meters in 11.78 and the 100 hurdles in 13.65. Wooton, a basketball player making her debut in track and field, had a high jump of 5-7 1/4, which bettered any mark by a Bruin last season.

The Santa Monica College men’s and women’s swim teams (each 6-0 overall and 4-0 in the Western State Conference) will compete at 2:30 p.m. Friday in conference meets at Ventura.

Against Valley last week, the SMC men won, 59-44, and the Corsair women were 70-59 winners.

Robert Hudek was a double winner for the Corsairs, taking the 500-yard freestyle in 4:51.28 and the 1,000 free in 10:09.64. He also anchored the winning 400 free relay team of Chris Hall, Mike Frazier and James Ament. Hall won the 200 free in 1:49.54.

SMC’s Karry O’Mahoney won the 50 backstroke in 29.81 and the 100 back in 1:05, and teammate Jeannie Chick took the 500 free in 5:31.32.

The No. 3 UCLA women’s softball team (23-2 and 9-1 in the Pac-10) will play host to U.S. International (13-23-1) at 1 p.m. Saturday and to No. 2 Fresno State (34-5) at 1 p.m. Sunday at Sunset Canyon.

The Bruins defeated Fresno State last May to win the NCAA championship. Earlier this season, the Bulldogs shut out UCLA, 2-0, in Fresno.

UCLA senior third baseman Janice Parks, school career leader in five offensive categories, leads the team this season with a .359 batting average and 15 runs batted in.

Junior All-American pitcher Lisa Longaker is 11-1 with 74 strikeouts in 76 innings. Freshman Tiffany Boyd is 8-1 with a save and has struck out 85 in 63 innings.

Coming off a four-game sweep of St. Mary’s at home, the Pepperdine baseball team (25-12-1 overall and 10-2 in the West Coast Athletic Conference) will play a four-game series this weekend at Nevada Reno (23-17, 6-2).

Single games are Friday and Sunday and there is a Saturday double-header.

Against St. Mary’s, second baseman Matt Howard, who leads the team with a .392 batting average, was nine for 15 at the plate, and shortstop Chris Martin was eight for 15. Britt Craven and Sean Casey pitched shutouts.

The Santa Monica College baseball team (14-18 overall, 5-7 in the WSC as the week started) will play at Santa Barbara City at 2 p.m. today and play host to Ventura at 1 p.m. Saturday at Marine Park.

Last week SMC’s Jeff Brennan (3-2) was the winning pitcher in a 15-6 defeat of Cuesta and a 7-1 victory over Bakersfield. The Corsairs lost to Pierce, 7-6.

The ninth annual Optimist Club of Santa Monica high school all-star basketball games will be played Saturday at Santa Monica College. The girls will play at 6:30 p.m., the boys at 8:30. Tickets are $6 for adults, $3 for high school students with identification and $2 for children younger than 12.

Girl players on the North team from the Westside include Westlake School’s Lisa Cohen, Carol Koh and Kim Willis; Culver City High’s Melissa Punch, Erica Isono and Alyssa Miyamoto; Tamara Battle of Palisades, Jeanette Salazar and Debbie Perry of Beverly Hills and Judy Nakashima of Venice.

North boy players include Eric Clark of University, Jason Edwards and Earic Peters of Palisades, Cyrus Yarborough and David Hanson of Santa Monica, Chris Cotton of St. Monica and Rudy Henry of Crossroads.

The game is sponsored by the Santa Monica club in conjunction with other Optimist clubs.

Jason Lucky, a second-team all-state wide receiver from St. Bernard High School, has been added to the South team roster for the 38th annual Shrine North-South All-Star high school football game on July 29 at the Rose Bowl. Those previously named to the South team include offensive lineman Kevin Kelly of Santa Monica High and wide receiver Michael Moore of Beverly Hills High.