THE COLLEGES : Bakersfield Next in Line to Challenge CSUN Home Win Streak

The streak is at 51 and counting.

When will it end? Perhaps as early as Friday.

That’s when Cal State Northridge, ranked 11th in the National Collegiate Athletic Assn. Division II women’s volleyball poll plays host to ninth-ranked Cal State Bakersfield in a California Collegiate Athletic Assn. match that features a couple of intriguing twists.

Northridge, which has won 51 CCAA matches in a row at home, has already lost twice to Bakersfield this season. The Lady Matadors dropped two of three games against Bakersfield at the UC Davis tournament in early September, and on Oct. 3 at Bakersfield, the Roadrunners swept CSUN in three games.

However, salvaging the home winning streak is not foremost on the mind of Walt Ker, the Northridge coach.

“The streak is very nice to hear about, but it really doesn’t mean much to me,” Ker said. “It’s a media-oriented statistic. The new players in the conference, it can’t be very meaningful to them because they haven’t had anything to do with it. The only time I even mention (the streak) is when I’m recruiting.”

Ker is more concerned about CSUN’s place in the CCAA standings.

The Lady Matadors enter Friday’s match 15-9 overall and 3-3 in conference matches. Bakersfield is 10-10 overall and 4-2 in the CCAA. Both teams trail top-ranked UC Riverside, which is 16-1 overall and 6-0 in conference games.

Another CCAA loss would equal CSUN’s total in the previous seven seasons combined. Northridge has never lost more than three conference matches in a season and has a 94-10 record since the CCAA was formed in 1981.

“It sounds trite, but fundamentals will make the difference for us,” Ker said. “That’s been our focus for the last three or four weeks. We’ve been working hard to gain some consistency, and when we do, we’re going to be tough.

“We continue to execute in practice, train hard and be coachable every day. I know evidence of that work is going to come forth in matches. We’re ready to pop.”

Northridge’s last meeting against Bakersfield marked one of the Lady Matadors’ worst performances of the season.

“We played poorly, but Bakersfield also is a very good team,” Ker said. “This will give us a true test of how far we’ve come in the last few weeks.”

And, on a more personal note, Ker does not relish the prospect of dropping another decision to Dave Rubio, his protege.

Rubio, who played for Ker at Granada Hills High and Northridge, is in his third season as Bakersfield’s coach. Rubio’s assistant, Rob Wortmann, was formerly a CSUN assistant. Both men were ushers at Ker’s wedding and are counted among his best friends. “If there is a person who I’ve talked more volleyball with than anyone else, it would have to be Dave,” Ker said. “Any time I coach against a friend, it becomes that much more meaningful.”

Pulling the plug: The Cal Lutheran women’s volleyball season came to a merciful--and premature--close with a three-game loss to Christ College on Tuesday. Cal Lutheran’s final match, against Redlands, was canceled.

The Redlands match was to be played Saturday, which is the day of Cal Lutheran’s football homecoming game. The Cal Lutheran players reportedly weren’t too excited about missing homecoming to travel to Redlands for another match after losing their 20th match of the season. Redlands agreed to release the Regals from their obligation.

The 0-20 record is the worst of any team in Cal Lutheran history. The men’s basketball team set the previous record for futility with a 2-24 record in 1967-68.

Only two years ago, the volleyball team finished 31-7, but the program went into a precipitous slide this year when only two players returned from the 1988 squad.

Loss ledger: Cal Lutheran’s 38-15 loss to Santa Clara on Saturday dropped the Kingsmen to 2-5 and assured the team of its fourth consecutive losing season.

In the 28 years Cal Lutheran has played football, the school had recorded only two sub-.500 seasons prior to 1986.

Wide margins: Valley College’s 47-0 win over Compton last Saturday marked the Monarchs’ biggest margin of victory since last season’s 64-16 decision over Pierce.

Meanwhile, Pierce defeated West L. A., 30-15, on Saturday, thereby doubling its 1988 win total. Pierce was 1-9 last season after resurrecting the sport after a two-year hiatus. The Brahmas are 2-4 this season.

On the mend: The pins and stitches have been removed from the injured left index finger of Mike Demeter, Cal Lutheran’s leading rebounder and second-leading scorer last season, and Demeter should be able to participate in basketball practice in about a week.

While working a summer job, Demeter, a 6-foot-7 senior center, had his hand crushed in a truck door. The injury required 18 stitches and two pins in his finger.

Basketball practice began Sunday, but Coach Mike Dunlap has kept Demeter on the sidelines where he watches practice or rides a stationary bike.

“He doesn’t want anything to happen. I can be accident prone at times,” Demeter said. “I had been playing with the team before I had the surgery to take the pins out, and it was feeling OK.”

Demeter said that he can’t bend the finger because of ligament damage, and he will have to tape it to his middle finger when he plays.

Little big man: Occidental tailback Gary Little was limited to 68 yards in 21 carries during the Tigers’ 44-14 victory over Claremont last week, but the freshman from San Francisco maintained his position at the top of the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference rushing list.

Little is averaging 136.2 yards. Claremont was the first team to hold Little to less than 100 yards since he became a starter in the third game of the season.

Despite quarterback Tony Werbelow’s performance against Claremont (11 for 14 for 198 yards and three touchdowns), Occidental remains last in the conference in passing offense (111.8 yards a game).

The Tigers (5-1 overall, 3-0 in conference play) are second in the conference behind Redlands in total offense and total defense. Occidental will meet Redlands (3-3, 3-0) next week in what figures to be a showdown for the SCIAC title.

On the rise: The Northridge men’s soccer team took some big steps toward winning its sixth consecutive CCAA championship with victories over Bakersfield and Cal Poly Pomona last week.

The Matadors’ 1-0 win over Bakersfield (13-3-1, 3-2-1) gave CSUN (8-3-3, 5-1-1) sole possession of first place in the CCAA. The victory over Pomona allowed Northridge to maintain its one-point lead on Cal Poly San Luis Obispo (7-2-6, 4-1-2).

Bakersfield’s 2-0 loss to San Luis Obispo last Saturday left the Roadrunners in third place, four points behind CSUN, which has three wins and a tie since a 2-1 overtime loss to Chapman 2 1/2 weeks ago.

“That game kind of woke us up,” forward Bobby Reyes said. “We dominated it, but their guy made two incredible shots to beat us. We knew then that we had to bear down. We knew then that we couldn’t lose any more games in conference and still win it.”

The CCAA champion earns an automatic berth in the NCAA Division II playoffs. The conference runner-up would be eligible for an at-large berth.

Gary Klein and staff writers Mike Hiserman, John Ortega and Brendan Healey contributed to this notebook.