NOTEBOOK : Raub’s Encore as Basketball Coach a Success for Kennedy Girls’ Team

Their eyes bugged out, because right in front of them was a guy they thought had bugged out long ago.

“The referees were great,” Craig Raub said. “I hadn’t seen them in a while, and their eyes got real big.”

Raub, you see, returned briefly as coach of the Kennedy High girls’ basketball team last week. He coached the Golden Cougars to three City Section 4-A Division titles and nine Valley 4-A League titles in nine seasons. He retired in 1987, however, leaving Toya Holiday--one of his former players--in charge.

Holiday, however, teaches at Frost Junior High in Granada Hills and does not arrive at Kennedy until well into the afternoon. The varsity game against Chatsworth last week was scheduled too early for Holiday to make it for the tip-off.

So Raub, 37, who remains at Kennedy--where he coaches tennis and is an assistant with the football team--volunteered.

It appears he hasn’t lost his touch. By the time Holiday arrived at halftime, Kennedy enjoyed a 37-12 lead en route to a 63-34 victory.

Actually, it seems as though Kennedy, which has switched to the West Valley League, can win with anybody at the helm. The Golden Cougars’ two wins last week stretched their win streak in league play to a state-record 134 over the past 14 seasons, Raub said. The streak spans the tenures of four different coaches.

Legal move: Although some City Section football coaches have raised questions about their eligibility, Brian Brison and Leonice Brown appear to have satisfied state rules with their transfers to San Fernando. Brison left Alemany and enrolled at San Fernando last week and Brown, who left Crespi, will enroll Monday.

State eligibility rules require an athlete to sit out 12 calendar months after he or she transfers unless the athlete has moved or can prove hardship.

Brison, a sophomore wide receiver and defensive back who also runs track, has moved into the San Fernando attendance area from the Poly area. Brown, a junior tailback who rushed for 1,097 yards last season, also claims he recently has moved. He declined to give details.

San Fernando football Coach Tom Hernandez said that the students will have no trouble gaining eligibility. “We make sure everything is OK before we do things around here,” he said.

Delayed decision: Sylmar’s Jerome Casey, who might have been the area’s most versatile football player last season, probably will not make a decision on a college by Feb. 14, the first day high school seniors can sign national letters of intent. Casey has visited Nebraska, Washington and Washington State and will visit USC this weekend.

He has failed to score 700 on the Scholastic Aptitude Test as required for athletic eligibility under NCAA Proposition 48. He took the test again Saturday but will not get the results until after Feb. 14.

Casey said he was nervous the first time he took the test but that he is confident he will score sufficiently.

“I was nervous because I know the test meant so much,” he said. “They’re basing so much of what happens to you on one test. But I’ve been taking an SAT class and I felt a lot better the second time.”

USC is Casey’s first choice, but school policy prohibits accepting Prop. 48 athletes. Casey might follow the example of Curtis Conway, the Hawthorne High quarterback who sat out the 1989 season until he passed the SAT. Conway will attend USC next fall on a scholarship.

Casey, 5-foot-10, 180 pounds, rushed for 1,447 yards, caught 14 passes for 378 yards and scored 26 touchdowns last fall. He also led the team with 70 tackles as a safety but said that he is being recruited as a running back.

Brave youth: A week away from the boys’ basketball playoffs, first-year Coach Alan Bennett of Birmingham might have the only surprising entry from the Valley Pac-8 Conference, a 74-61 loss to Sylmar on Thursday night notwithstanding. Four teams will advance to postseason play--two from each of the Mid-Valley and East Valley leagues.

North Hollywood and Reseda (Mid-Valley) and Grant (East Valley) have playoff berths all but sewn up, as expected. But Birmingham? The East Valley League team’s coach called the season “a rebuilding year” way back in November.

Talk about euphemisms. “Rebuilding year” generally translates into, “We may win a game or two if Jupiter aligns with its third moon and a couple of calls go our way.”

But Bennett has made the phrase a truism. Young players dominate a team learning Bennett’s system. The Braves’ starters include four juniors, and five of the top six players will return next year.

Junior Brian Bennett (no relation to the coach) is averaging 14 points in conference play. Fellow junior Kevin Horton, playing the first organized basketball of his life, is averaging 10 points and nine rebounds in conference play.

Three more juniors--guard Chet Chea and big men Noah Kirshbaum (6-4) and Ignacio Esteeva (6-5)--round out the youth movement.

And, with a 4-4 league record, the Braves are one game ahead of third-place Sylmar with two games remaining. In other words, Bennett just may have built a playoff team.

“We’re not world-beaters, but we’re starting to jell,” Bennett said.

Play ball: Reseda’s Mike Hawkins, a starter averaging 12 points and five rebounds a game, is making a timely return from an ankle injury.

Hawkins will be ready to play tonight when his team faces Mid-Valley League leader North Hollywood. With a win, Reseda could grab a share of first place.

“He’s fine,” Reseda Coach Jeff Halpern said. “He’s ready to go. He’s been jumping all week.”

Open for business: Anybody want to play a little football next fall? Looking for a little nonleague action? Give Granada Hills Athletic Director Don Stone a yell.

Granada Hills, the defending North Valley League champion, has open dates on Sept. 14, 22 and 27.

Finding volunteers has not been easy. Hart recently backed away from a Stone offer.

“They said we were too good,” said Stone, a statement Hart Coach Mike Herrington admitted that he had made.

Crespi was released from its Sept. 22 game at Pierce College so that the Celts could play former Del Rey League nemesis Loyola. Crespi and Loyola will be in different leagues next season.

“That’s a big money-maker for Crespi, so we let them out (of the agreement),” Stone said. “That could have been a good one--a Saturday night game at Pierce.”

En garde: The verbal posturing, it seems, has not ended.

Canoga Park basketball Coach Jeff Davis started the battle a month ago when he said he believed that two of his players, Marcus Reed and Lindsey Dunbar, formed the second-best guard tandem in the Valley. Only Cleveland’s Eddie Hill and Andre Chevalier were better, in Davis’ opinion.

After Davis’ statement was published, Granada Hills captain Jermoine Brantley took exception to the remarks--and pointedly said so.

Granada Hills has since upset Cleveland, so Brantley and backcourt mate Osiris Nalls have a right to claim the top spot, Brantley said.

“Before the (Cleveland) game, we got together,” Brantley said. “We talked about how important it was in terms of the game but also to us as guards. We wanted all the skepticism (about who ranks first) to be tilted in our favor.”

For what it’s worth, Nalls and Brantley outscored Hill and Chevalier, 37 to 28.

Yet there is evidence to suggest that Brantley might not quite believe his own claims. For instance, after the Highlanders beat Cleveland, Brantley approached Hill and Chevalier and offered this frank assessment of what took place: “I told them they played a good game,” Brantley said. “And that it took an excellent performance from our team to win.”

Staff writers Steve Elling, John Lynch and Brian Murphy contributed to this notebook.