COLLEGE ROUNDUP : UC Irvine Women Finish Second

With three runners finishing in the top 10, the UC Irvine women’s cross-country team finished second in the Stanford Invitational Saturday in Palo Alto.

Irvine, ranked 12th in the nation, finished with 87 points behind No. 7 Brigham Young, which had 74. The Anteaters defeated sixth-ranked Wisconsin and eighth-ranked Arkansas.

Wisconsin’s Suzy Favor won the 5,000-meter race in 16 minutes 27 seconds, Irvine’s Buffy Rabbitt finished second in 16:34 and Rayna Cervantes (17:09) and Traci Goodrich (17:13) finished ninth and 10th for Irvine.

In her first race with the Anteaters, Maria Akraka finished 28th in 17:48.

The Irvine men’s team finished in seventh with 164 points. Arkansas won with 36.

Ben Ayers ran 24:47 on the 8,000-meter course for 19th place to lead the Anteaters.

In the Biola cross-country invitational:

Former Dana Hills High School runner Mike Tansley was third overall and led a Cal State Fullerton sweep of the Division I men’s team competition. Tansley, who attends Long Beach City College with his twin brother, Andrew, led Dana Hills to the state championship in 1988. He ran 26:16 on a five-mile course at La Mirada Regional Park. Ray Trujillo (26:19), Mike Richardson (26:26) and Greg Neitzel (27:08) finished fourth, fifth and sixth and Tom Wright-Hay (27:15) finished ninth for the Titans.

The Titans also won the women’s team competition. Kami Howden finished seventh overall with a time of 19:42 for 5,000 meters and Kristin Peters (19:52) finished eighth.

In Big West Conference water polo:

UC Irvine 15, Fresno State 12--Led by sophomore Steve Gill’s five goals, Irvine defeated Fresno State, 15-12, at Clovis West High School.

Fresno’s John Walker scored early in the fourth quarter to give the ninth-ranked Bulldogs (8-11, 0-2 in the conference) an 11-10 lead, but Anteaters Steve Froning, Tom Lowrey and Skylar Putnam each scored to give Irvine (8-6, 1-0) a 13-11 lead. Lowrey’s goal came with 4 minutes 8 seconds remaining and gave the Anteaters, ranked seventh in the nation, a 12-11 lead they never relinquished.

Pablo Yrizar, Putnam and Lowrey each scored three goals for Irvine. Damien Moston scored five goals and Don Kenney scored four to lead Fresno.

In Big West Conference volleyball:

Hawaii 3, UC Irvine 0--Kim Collins had eight kills and 10 digs, but the Anteaters (5-11, 1-6) fell to No. 4 Hawaii (13-2, 7-0), 15-4, 15-9, 15-7.

Fresno State 3, Cal State Fullerton 1--Becky Howlett had 24 kills for host Fullerton (3-16, 0-6), but the Titans still lost their 12th consecutive match. Fresno (8-9, 3-3) won, 15-9, 13-15, 16-14, 15-11.

In the New Mexico State collegiate golf tournament:

UC Irvine is tied for seventh at 594 with New Mexico State’s second team, nine shots behind team-leader Stanford, going into today’s final round. Irvine’s Joey Sugar, who shot three-over-par 75 on the University Golf Course in Las Cruces for a two-day total of 147, is in an 11-player tie for 11th place, five shots behind the leader, John Geiberger of Pepperdine. Other Irvine golfers: William Yanagisawa (148, tied for 22nd place), Mike Suckling (149, tied for 29th), Adam Horodyski (150, tied for 37th) and Mike Davis (158, tied for 78th).