College Baseball / Gary Klein : These Potential Pros Make the Question Academic

Joe Ciccarella is the latest example of a phenomenon unique to Mater Dei High School in Santa Ana, which has proved a fertile recruiting ground for college baseball coaches but a barren land for professional scouts hoping to sign 18-year-old prospects.

During Bob Ickes’ 15 years as head coach at Mater Dei, 20 players have been drafted by major league teams, and not one of them has signed out of high school.

“It’s not me telling them not to sign,” Ickes said. “I think a lot of times they realize they’re not ready for the bus trips and the things pro ball offers. Also, parents are sending a kid here for the academics. When you’re spending good money, you want them educated.”

Tuition at Mater Dei is $2,600 a year.

Last season, Ciccarella was drafted out of Mater Dei in the fourth round by the Philadelphia Phillies. He turned down the team’s offer of more than $100,000 and enrolled at Loyola Marymount.

“I had hopes of signing, but I think I scared a lot of clubs off, coming out of Mater Dei,” said Ciccarella, who had a 3.5 grade-point average in high school. “Coach Ickes instills that if you’re a good player, the opportunity will come to you. He doesn’t decide anything. He didn’t talk to me about my situation until it was all over.”

Add Ciccarella: Used mostly as an outfielder this season, Ciccarella has been instrumental in Loyola’s drive to the National Collegiate Athletic Assn. tournament. The Lions, ranked 18th in this week’s Collegiate Baseball poll, open play against 14th-ranked Oklahoma today in the West I Regional at Tucson.

The 6-foot-3, 195-pound Ciccarella is batting .328 with two home runs and 35 runs batted in and was selected as rookie of the year in the West Coast Athletic Conference. In a four-game series against St. Mary’s, Ciccarella went 10 for 16.

“I couldn’t do anything wrong,” Ciccarella said. “That’s where I really started having fun.”

Things weren’t so rosy last summer when Dave Snow, who recruited Ciccarella to Loyola, left to become coach at Cal State Long Beach and was replaced by former Loyola assistant Chris Smith.

“The phone started ringing,” Ciccarella recalled. “All the pro people wanted to know what I was thinking. I almost left, but I’m glad I didn’t.

“Coach Smith has been great and we’re going to the playoffs. This is what it’s all about.”

Patience pays off: Is there anyone happier about Cal State Long Beach’s fortunes this season than senior second baseman Chris Gill?

“It’s kind of like a dream coming true,” said Gill, a four-year starter. “They say good things happen for those who wait.”

Gill went from playing on a Mater Dei High team that was ranked No. 1 in the nation for most of his senior season in 1986 to a Long Beach team that was 14-33-1 his freshman year.

“It was brutal,” Gill said. “My whole life, I had been on winning teams and I was living in the past my whole freshman year.

“Every year I thought it was going to get better because there was no way it could get worse.”

Unfortunately for Gill, it did.

The 49ers finished 16-41-1 in 1987 and 14-45 in 1988.

“I was really close to leaving, but I thought I owed something to the team to stay here,” Gill said. “My parents taught me that when you start something, you finish it. That theory has helped me out.”

So has the arrival of Snow, who led Long Beach to a share of its first Big West Conference championship. The 12th-ranked 49ers open play in the NCAA tournament against Hawaii today at Tucson.

A switch-hitter his first three seasons, Gill never batted higher than .263. This season, batting only right-handed, his average has increased to .366.

“It’s different when you play with a team that, all the way up and down the lineup, people hit,” Gill said. “It’s the atmosphere. I always knew I could play.”

Eyeing a title: Pepperdine second baseman Matt Howard has a simple approach to hitting.

“I don’t take many pitches,” Howard says.

He doesn’t miss many either.

The 5-foot-9, 170-pound senior has struck out only seven times in 261 at-bats this season.

Howard was a first-team All-WCAC selection, batting .348 with six home runs and 45 RBIs for the 17th-ranked Waves.

College Baseball Notes

Cal State Long Beach left-hander Kyle Abbott has set single-season school records for victories (14), shutouts (three), innings (123 2/3) and strikeouts (135). . . . Cal State Fullerton, which finished 30-27 overall, is missing the NCAA playoffs for only the third time since 1975. The Titans committed 125 errors this season--one shy of the school record set in 86 games in 1984 when Fullerton won the national title. David Staton, who batted .371 with 18 homers and 77 RBIs, had a .756 slugging percentage, breaking a 10-year-old record held by Tim Wallach.

Texas A&M; catcher Eric Albright, a senior from Rolling Hills, was selected as most valuable player of the Southwest Conference tournament last weekend. Albright hit a grand slam and a three-run homer against Texas for a tournament-record seven RBIs. He is batting .332 with 15 homers and 70 RBIs for the top-ranked Aggies, who are playing host to the Central Regional at College Station, Tex. Pat Sweet, a junior left-hander from Paramount, is 9-3 with a 3.72 earned-run average for the Aggies.

Jason Moler, a freshman right-hander from Esperanza High, gave up five hits as Illinois beat Michigan, 2-0, Saturday to win its first Big Ten Tournament championship since 1963. Illinois (41-14) will play Pennsylvania in the first round of the Northeast Regional at Waterbury, Conn. . . . Rod Stillwell, a senior shortstop from Thousand Oaks who is the younger brother of Kansas City Royals’ shortstop Kurt Stillwell, is batting .363 with 31 RBIs for 10th-ranked Arkansas, which tied Texas A&M; for a share of its first Southwest Conference title. It was the first time in 11 years that Texas has not had at least a share of the title.

Oklahoma State outfielder Steve Dailey, a freshman from Ventura, is batting a team-high .407 with five home runs and 28 RBIs. . . . San Diego State pitcher Rob Brown recorded a school-record 122 strikeouts in 114 2/3 innings this season, breaking the record of 115 strikeouts set by Bob Cluck in 1966. Brown, a senior, finished 10-5 with a 2.90 ERA. . . . Brad Stone of College of Idaho, a junior right-hander from Pasadena, was selected as pitcher of the year in the Timber Prairie Athletic Conference. Stone was 11-3 with a 2.38 ERA.