THE ‘80s A DECADE REVISITED :...

1985

Canyon High extended its football winning streak to 38 games and Donna Duke extended the imagination by making 12 holes-in-one.

. . . and the streak went on.

Going into the 1985 football season, Canyon High had won 24 games in a row. At season’s end, the Cowboys had tacked on 14 more wins without a loss. Canyon Country finished its second consecutive perfect season by edging Antelope Valley, 9-7, in the Southern Section Northwestern Conference title game.

But it wasn’t pretty. The Cowboys, who had been averaging 32 points a game, fumbled five times, missed a conversion and didn’t play well on offense against a team they had beaten, 30-6, four weeks before.

Antelope Valley had only 145 yards in total offense and never got inside Canyon’s 20 but still had a chance at a major upset because of a fourth-quarter blunder. A snap on a punt went over the head of Canyon punter Randy Austin. Austin, the team’s star tight end and linebacker, ran down the football and tried to pass, but the ball landed in the hands of Antelope Valley’s James Richards, who rambled 20 yards for a touchdown with 2:41 left.

“That was our best offensive play of the game,” cracked Antelope Valley Coach Brent Newcomb.

The Cowboys recovered an onside kick to preserve the win--and the streak. “The team is 38-0,” Welch said. “They’ve won in the rain. They’ve won in the heat. They’ve won in Central California and they’ve won here. They’re 38-0. Who else can say that?”

She will be a topic of discussion at the 19th hole for years.

With an ace on the 18th hole of the Clark Golf Course at the Pt. Mugu Naval Air Base on July 26, Donna Duke of Camarillo set a world record by making 12 hole-in-ones in the span of one year.

Duke’s hole-in-one broke a 23-year record of 11 by Dr. Boyd Stone of Bakersfield.

Despite the fact that Duke had 28 witnesses to the 12 hole-in-ones, Golf Digest magazine, which verifies golf records, refused to certify her record.

Duke, 54, a retired civil service worker, made 20 hole-in-ones from Sept. 22, 1984, to Oct. 24, 1986.

The Lady Matador softball team, behind pitcher Kathy Slaten, defeated Akron to win its third consecutive NCAA Division II title. Slaten, a junior, was 41-11 and had 533 strikeouts in 410 1/3 innings.

She finished her career the following season as a four-time Division II All-American and three-time Division II Player of the Year. Slaten’s career record at CSUN was 133-33-1 and she allowed only 41 earned runs in 1,221 2/3 innings--a 0.23 ERA.

In her CSUN career, she had 97 shutouts and 1,537 strikeouts.

Notable: The CSUN women’s volleyball team reached the NCAA Division II final for the second consecutive year but lost--for the second consecutive year--to Portland State. . . .

More than nine years and 97 matches after it began, the Pierce College winning streak in Metropolitan Conference tennis matches came to an end in a 5-1 loss to Harbor. The Brahmas won their first Ojai tournament title, however, which was a special treat for Coach Paul Xanthos, who played in the tournament as a Los Angeles City College freshman in 1939. . . .

Despite being limited to only one full scholarship, the CSUN men’s swimming team won its fifth consecutive NCAA Division II championship and ninth in 11 years. . . .

Tom Keele, the football coach at Cal State Northridge, was axed after a 4-7 season that included a 61-24 season-ending loss to Portland State. . . .

Middleweight Michael Nunn made his professional debut in the Valley an auspicious one by knocking out Robert Jackson in 72 seconds of the first round at the Reseda Country Club. . . .