Aztecs Upset No. 14 Lady Vols

Here’s why they play the game: San Diego State on Wednesday entered the NCAA women’s tennis championships at Stanford ranked 18th in the nation. Its opponent was No. 14 Tennessee.

SDSU ended up beating the higher-ranked Volunteers. In fact, the match didn’t even get so far as the doubles court. SDSU won it in singles, 5-1.

But the match was closer than the final team score indicates. Four of the singles matches went three sets and tie-breakers were needed in four sets.

SDSU’s winners were: No. 1 Dorey Brandt, No. 3 Nicole Storto, No. 4 Paige Hammond, No. 5 Sue Hawke, and No. 6 Tanya Lauer.

The Aztecs get a much tougher draw today. They play No. 2 Stanford at 3 p.m.

The University of San Diego, ranked 17th, wasn’t nearly as fortunate as SDSU, losing 5-1 to No. 16 Mississippi.

The Toreras’ only victory came at No. 6 singles--Paula Hansen defeated Ivy Conoley, 6-4, 6-2. Hansen had half the number of sets won by USD. Only Julie McKeon at No. 3 singles and Laura Richards at No. 4 took their opponent to three sets.

At No. 1, Tonya Fuller, ranked 21st in the nation, lost to No. 22 Paloma Collantes, 7-5, 6-3. At No. 2, Tuck Kacharoen, ranked 36th, was routed by unranked Alison Hill, 6-0, 6-1.

USD finished 12-12. Fuller and Kacharoen will play next week in the NCAA singles championships, and Fuller will team with McKeon in the doubles competition. Mississippi (16-7) will face No. 4 UCLA today.

BASEBALL

James Gibson hit two home runs, including a grand slam, and U.S. International had four homers total, but the Gulls ran afoul of pitching, losing to visiting Cal State Fullerton, 17-8.

Three of the Gulls’ homers came after 6 1/2 innings when the score was 17-2.

Greg Shepard and Mike Murphy had the other two home runs--both with the bases empty--for USIU (15-38). Gigson had five RBIs.

No. 29 CSUF (32-21) had one homer among its 22 hits.

USIU plays its final home games--probably ever--Sunday when it meets Loyola Marymount in a doubleheader.

FOOTBALL

John Self was named to replace Brad Elrod as Poway High’s varsity football coach. Self, the school’s athletic director, inherits a team that finished 4-5-1 and has not won a league title since 1980.

Self stressed that he plans on building a program.

“We’re going to spend a lot of time developing team work, attitude and continuity,” Self said. “The key is developing a program with a lot of emphasis on developing players and techniques.”

Self was an assistant at Poway from 1979 to 1980 and 1983 to 1989. He was Mt. Carmel’s first varsity football coach from 1975-78. Before that, he was offensive coordinator at Anaheim Servite for a year and headed programs at Calexico and Calapatria. He assisted at Mesa College in 1981-82.