Clean-Up Effort Nets San Pasqual a Tidy Little Sum

San Pasqual baseball Coach Bill McAllister wouldn’t mind making a clean sweep of the Avocado League, but he would settle for a clean sweep of the city of Escondido.

For the second straight year, McAllister’s team raised money for the program by cleaning up the community.

Last year, the Golden Eagles devoted six hours on a Saturday to a 12-square block area and planted trees, cleaned culverts and ditches, picked up trash and large items of junk, painted over graffiti and even hauled away a couple of junk cars. The city, with the help of councilman Kris Murphy, provided dumpsters, trucks and a crew that had jobs lined up for the athletes. This year, they did the same thing in a different area.

“Basically,” McAllister said, “we cleaned up a neighborhood that wasn’t looking real good when we got there and was looking 1,000% better when we left.”

They also cleaned up financially. Soliciting pledes based on hours worked or flat fees, the San Pasqual athletes raised $6,500 last year for itself and $4,200 this year in conjunction with the golf team, which earned $1,500.

“We try to give it back to the kids in some form--uniforms, equipment--but it was much better received than a hit-a-thon where we go hit in for 12 hours,” McAllister said. “That was like asking people to donate money and not receive anything in return. But people were able to see a marked difference from when we arrived (in the community) and when we left.

“I haven’t heard of a candy sale yet that matches what we’ve raised, and there’s no way they can touch the kind of feeling these kids have when they get done that day working.”

Trivia time: Only school team has won only one boys’ and one girls’ San Diego Section swimming championship. Which one?

Double trouble: Poway baseball players Donnie Jones and Miles Kelly hit back-to-back home runs in back-to-back games. Jones and Kelly homered in the fourth inning off Vista’s Matt Stone and homered in the third inning off San Dieguito’s Terrin Durfey. It was the third homer of the year for each.

Quotebook: Bo Ginsberg, Torrey Pines right fielder, describing the Falcons’ baseball team: “Our team’s like a McDLT--the hot side’s hot, the cold side’s cold.”

No backup: Midway Baptist’s baseball team won in unusual fashion last week when Borrego Springs Coach John Acquarelli was ejected in the sixth inning.

Borrego was leading, 2-1, when Acquarelli was ejected for arguing a call at first base in the top of the sixth inning. Since no other Borrego official was available to supervise, Borrego had to forfeit the game.

With the victory, Midway Baptist moved into a first-place tie with Borrego with a 4-1 record.

Get there early: Vista High School will be the site Sept. 13 when four of the best football programs in the county get together for a doubleheader. In the first game, Point Loma plays defending 2-A champion El Camino. In the second game, it’s 3-A champion Morse against Rancho Buena Vista.

“We tried to get that doubleheader before a San Diego State game,” Morse Coach John Shacklett said. “We didn’t get it past the NCAA. They thought it would be an unfair advantage for SDSU (and) I imagine the Padres would be pretty uptight having three games on the field.”

Temporary bleachers will be installed at Vista to accomodate what is expected to be huge crowd, Shacklett said. He also said he was trying to drum up interest in expanding Balboa Stadium.

“I figure we could pull in 12,000 (fans) for the games, but there’s no stadium to hold it,” he said. “Vista says they can put 10,000 in there.”

As if RBV isn’t a tough enough nonleague opponent, Morse plays Los Angeles City champion Carson the following weekend.

Bull’s-eye: Mt. Carmel senior Ryan Houston hasn’t had the best of luck this season. Before a game earlier this season, he was hit by a player swinging a bat.

Taking batting practice before a game a week later, Houston was hit in the eye by a pitching machine ball. And before another game two days later, Houston got a bloody nose but insisted he was OK.

“We don’t exactly know how the bloody nose happened (and) he refused to be taken out of the lineup,” said his coach, Steve Edwards. “We call him ‘The Target.’ When he warms up, we put him in the outfield about 30 feet away from everybody else.”

A break is a break: A bad break for Scott Lyons turned out to be a good one for Rancho Buena Vista’s Travis Wilson. Lyons broke his shoulder blade in the second game of the season when he collided with Grossmont catcher Todd Cady. Wilson, who platooned at catcher for the junior varsity last season, became the starter. He has responded by batting .302, fourth-highest on the team.

Baker’s handful: Baker University in Baldwin City, Kan., has found a pipeline for soccer talent that runs through San Diego. Poway’s Nate Houser went to Baker last year on scholarship and emerged as a starter. Poway graduate Chris Nutting, who played two years at San Diego Mesa College, went to Baker midway this year and will play for the Wildcats next year. And over the weekend, three more Poway players--Kai Morris, Matt Sanders and Rian Watts--went to Baker on a recruiting trip.

“We had a kid (Houser) that went to Baker and really loved it,” Poway Coach Bob Champion said. “The coach (Sean Holmes) really liked Nate so he came back and took a look at us in the Torrey Pines Tournament and he liked a lot of our seniors.”

Trivia answer: Valhalla, which won the boys’ title in 1985 and the girls’ title in 1981. Only two schools have won only one boys’ title and three schools have won just one girls’ title.