NOTEBOOK : Battle in Pacific League Continues for 2nd Place

The Pacific League baseball championship already has been decided for Glendale-area playoff teams, but the race is still on.

Arcadia, which entered the week with a 13-0 record, will be the Pacific League’s No. 1 team when the playoffs begin next. Crescenta Valley (8-5) and Glendale (9-5) have assured themselves of berths in the Southern Section 5-A Division playoffs, but they are battling for second place and the higher seeding.

Crescenta Valley, which played Hoover on Tuesday night, concludes the season Friday at Arcadia. Glendale, which defeated Muir on Tuesday, concludes the regular season at Hoover.

“I kind of feel right now like we’re treading water,” said Crescenta Valley Coach Tony Zarillo, who will take his team to the playoffs for the fourth time in his four years with the Falcons. “I would hope at the end of the year that we go into the playoffs with some momentum.”

Overseas mission: Crescenta Valley pitcher John Breckow (6-foot-5, 180 pounds) has accepted an invitation to play on a high school team headed by Arcadia High Coach John Meiers that will play in Australia and New Zealand during a three-week tour this summer.

Breckow, who struck out 11 in a 9-0 win over Muir last week, will attempt to play as a walk-on at UC Santa Barbara next year.

Playoff time: The City and Southern Section boys’ volleyball playoffs started this week with nine Glendale-area teams participating.

On Tuesday Eagle Rock defeated Fairfax, 15-13, 13-15, 15-7, 15-11; Marshall defeated Gardena, 15-6, 15-6, 16-14; and Verdugo Hills played the Los Angeles Center for Enriched Studies in opening round City 3-A matches.

The Southern Section playoffs began Wednesday with La Canada playing at Notre Dame in a 3-A wild-card game.

Hoover opens play in a 4-A game Friday at Woodbridge and Glendale plays host to St. John Bosco.

Pater Noster plays host to St. Margaret’s today and Glendale Adventist plays host to Windward Friday in 2-A matches.

In another 2-A match Friday, Flintridge Prep will play the winner of Wednesday’s wild-card match between West L.A. Baptist and Bosco Tech.

Big event: The Occidental Invitational, a track meet that annually features some of the nation’s best individuals and collegiate and club teams, will be held Saturday at Occidental.

USC, UCLA, Cal State Northridge, Cal State Los Angeles, Arkansas and Rice are among the schools competing.

Field events begin at 5 p.m. and running events start at 6.

Still going strong: Occidental’s Jacqui Dent set two individual conference records and helped set another in a relay as Occidental’s women’s track team won its 13th consecutive Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference championship last Saturday at Pomona College.

Dent, a redshirt sophomore from New Jersey, won the 200 meters in 24.54 seconds, the 400 in 54.26 and was in on the 4 X 100 relay that finished in 48.27.

The Occidental men’s team finished second in the SCIAC behind Pomona.

Advanced technique: Several Glendale-area athletes who captured Pacific League titles will be among the athletes competing in the CIF Southern Section finals Saturday at Gahr High.

Margarito Casillas of Hoover will compete in the 3,200 meters and Glendale’s Mike Wright will participate in the long jump and high jump.

Crescenta Valley’s Robert Dilts will compete in the shot put and discus and Falcon teammate Paul Sheklow take part in the 100 meter high hurdles and 300 intermediate hurdles.

In girl’s competition, Crescenta Valley’s Nada Kawar will compete in the shot put and Sarah MacDougall will run in the 1,600 and 3,200 meter races.

Finalist: Glendale College runner Hugo Alan Garcia qualified for this week’s Southern California finals with strong performances at prelims last Saturday at Bakersfield College.

Garcia, a sophomore, qualified in the 5,000 in 15 minutes, 42.09 seconds. he also qualified in the 10,000 in 30:51.01.

Qualifier: Brian Hull of La Canada High qualified for next week’s Southern Section individual golf finals with his performance Monday at the Central Regional at the Sun Lakes Country Club in Banning.

Hull tied for fourth with a 4-over-par 76.

The Southern Section finals are at Palm Springs.

Impressive finish: Karen Pearson of Flintridge Prep was one of 10 girls finalists chosen for the California Interscholastic Federation scholar athlete scholarship.

Erin Pyka of El Toro High and Greg Siwek of Monte Vista High in Cupertino won the awards.

It’s over: The Occidental College baseball team concluded its season with a 14-20 overall record.

Mark Harris batted .336 and Jason Ruck batted .327 with seven home runs and 30 RBIs for the Tigers, who finished in fourth place in the SCIAC with a 9-9 record.

Still shooting: Basketball season might have ended but all-star games continue.

John Brown of Village Christian High scored 33 points and had 22 rebounds last Saturday to lead his East team to a 95-91 win over the West in the Camp Fire Stars and Stripes all-star game at Glendale High.

Jason Harper of Glendale High led the West with 25 points.

Staff writer Kirby Lee contributed to this notebook.