The Colleges : Northridge’s Torgeson Casts Cal State Bakersfield as Next Year’s Villain

Opponents love to hate the ladies in black--those young women who make up the Cal State Northridge softball team.

For eight years the Lady Matadors, with their menacing black uniforms, have been considered the bad girls of NCAA Division II softball. Eight times they won the California Collegiate Athletic Assn. championship. Eight times they won whichever regional they were sent to. Four times they were national champions, and twice they finished second.

All of which made them a special target every time they played.

Until now.

Now, says Gary Torgeson, the CSUN coach, Cal State Bakersfield will be wearing the bull’s-eye on its back.

“My tunnel vision next year is to get Bakersfield,” Torgeson said. “We’ve been on top so long we’ve never had to focus on any one team like that before, but they’re the ones we’re going to have to beat next season to get to nationals.”

Bakersfield, which finished fourth in the CCAA during the regular season, upset CSUN in the Division II Western regional last week and should have most of its team back next season. Bakersfield has defeated CSUN five of the past nine times the teams have met.

So, for the Roadrunners, Torgeson this week imparted the following:

“It’s easier to reach the top than it is to stay there,” the CSUN coach said. “We know that better than anyone else.”

Been there before: Cal Lutheran would appear to be no match in the experience department for the Kearney (Neb.) State team it will face today in the first round of the NAIA softball tournament in Midland, Mich.

Kearney State, the NAIA champion in 1987, has qualified for the national tournament eight times, more than any other school. Cal Lutheran made it for the first time last season.

In this case, however, the appearance is deceiving.

Seven of Cal Lutheran’s nine starters have played in the nationals. Kearney State has nine freshmen on its roster.

Shopping around: Southern Utah State has dropped its baseball program, leaving catcher Joe Sturges of Thousand Oaks without a team for his last two years of eligibility.

Sturges, a sophomore, batted .315 with four home runs and 33 runs batted in this season and earned a reputation for fiercely blocking the plate. The 6-foot, 210-pound catcher also started at inside linebacker for the Southern Utah football team--leading the team in interceptions with three and ranking second in tackles with 103--but he wants to transfer and concentrate on baseball.

Because Southern Utah dropped the baseball program, players who transfer do not lose a year of eligibility.

Shooting blanks: After a regular season in which Cal Lutheran won a school-record 31 games, the Kingsmen were blanked twice in the double-elimination District 3 playoffs at Westmont last week. It was the first time the Kingsmen had been shutout in back-to-back games.

Despite the forgettable finish, the Kingsmen had a memorable season. Cal Lutheran (31-18) defeated three Division I opponents--Pepperdine, UC Irvine and UC Santa Barbara--and finished third in the Golden State Athletic Conference.

Weight watchers: Cal State Northridge won nine of 19 women’s events--five more than team champion Cal Poly San Luis Obispo--in the California Collegiate Athletic Assn. track and field championships, but the Lady Matadors’ lack of depth in the weight events nullified any chance of winning the team title.

While runner-up CSUN failed to score in the shotput, discus and javelin, Cal Poly SLO had 29 points.

“We knew we were going to get killed in those events,” Northridge Coach Don Strametz said. “We just haven’t been able to recruit anyone in those events in recent years.”

The situation should improve next year. Strametz has signed highly regarded Christy Bruno of North County Salinas High and Tracey Meadors of Kern Valley High to letters of intent.

Summer break: Having set freshman school records in the 5,000- and 10,000-meter races this season, CSUN’s Sasha Vujic would appear to have a chance at qualifying for the U. S. junior national team--for athletes 19 and under--this summer.

Bob Augello, coach of CSUN’s distance runners, said Vujic’s season probably will conclude this month, in either the Santa Monica Distance Classic at Santa Monica City College on Saturday, or--should he qualify--the NCAA Division II championships in Hampton, Va., next week.

The Athletics Congress junior championships will be held in Columbus, Ohio, June 9-11.

“He’s ready for a rest,” Augello said after Vujic finished second in the 10,000 with a time of 30:44.38 seconds at the CCAA championships last Friday. “He’s been training very hard since January and he’s tired of it. When he was in high school, he never trained that hard for that long.”

Vujic has also run 14:30.14 in the 5,000 and 3:53.73 in the 1,500 this season.

Staff writers Mike Hiserman, John Ortega, Ralph Nichols and Steve Henson contributed to this notebook.