NOTEBOOK : Glendale College’s Football Team to Hold Scrimmage Before Opener

The Glendale College football team will prepare for its Sept. 8 opener at Pasadena City College with a scrimmage Saturday night at Cerritos College.

The Vaqueros were 5-4-1 overall and 5-3-1 in Western State Conference play under first-year Coach John Cicuto last season.

Cicuto, who was the team’s defensive coordinator under former Coach Jim Sartoris, is hoping to bring this year’s unit up to the level of Vaquero defenses of the past.

Free safety Keith Franklin, an all-WSC Northern Division second-team pick last season, is the top returnee from a defense that surrendered 26.8 points a game last season.

Returning sophomore Marco Arcipreste and Cole Speer, a transfer from Antelope Valley, will battle to replace Ronnie Lopez at quarterback and spearhead an offense that averaged 32.5 points a game in 1989.

For openers: Occidental College will travel to the University of San Diego for its football opener Sept. 8.

The Tigers are coming off a 7-2 finish last season when they captured their third consecutive Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference championship.

“Our goals are just a tad higher than we’ve been able to do lately,” said Occidental Coach Dale Widolff, who has led his team to the SCIAC title six times in the past eight years. “We’ve been able to win league, but to get to the playoffs you have to be 9-0 or 8-1.”

More openers: Flintridge Prep and Ribet Academy also are preparing for Sept. 8 football openers.

Flintridge Prep, which won the Southern Section Small Schools Division title last season with a 9-2 record, will play host to San Diego Bishop.

Ribet Academy (4-4 in 1989), in its second season fielding a football team, will be at Webb.

Checkered future: Tom Kendall of La Canada is on the verge of driving away with the Sports Club Car of America’s Trans-Am Series championship.

Last weekend at Denver, Kendall drove his Chevrolet Beretta to victory for the fourth time in five races.

Kendall, 23, averaged 63.24 m.p.h. over 50 laps of the 1.9-mile course through the streets of downtown Denver to edge Dorsey Schroeder by 0.8 seconds.

Everybody’s All-American: Vatche Shirkjian of Glendale earned All-American honors after helping the Trojan Water Polo Club to a second-place finish at the Junior Olympics U.S. Water Polo National Championships this month at Long Beach.

Shirkjian, a sophomore at Glendale High, was the only goaltender named to the All-American team.

Trojan lost to the Triton Club of San Clemente, 10-8, in the championship match.