CLU Finds Some Needed Doering-Do

Bob Doering, Cal Lutheran’s athletic director, had his hands full last week on the Kingsmen’s football trip to Sonoma State.

When some of Cal Lutheran’s luggage--including some uniforms--mysteriously disappeared and did not arrive at San Francisco International Airport with the team at 10 a.m., Doering took the job of investigator.

First, Doering waved goodby to the Kingsmen, who filed onto buses that would make the hourlong trip to Sonoma State. Then he got down to solving the case of the misplaced football bags.

Doering discovered that the luggage had been left behind in Los Angeles because all of it could not be placed on the same plane with the team. The bags had been put on a flight that was scheduled to arrive in San Francisco at noon, but the flight was delayed for a half-hour.

Meanwhile, at Cossack Stadium, the 1:30 p.m. game time rolled around. Some Cal Lutheran players were dressed in uniform; others were milling about in street clothes waiting for news from Doering. Sonoma State players had taken the field to warm up and were probably wondering if the Kingsmen would ever show their true colors. Fans became restless and some left.

Finally, at about 2:20 p.m., Doering arrived with the luggage. The game started at 3.

But Doering’s work was not finished. Now Doering had to worry about how to get his team back to the airport in time to catch its 8 p.m. flight. Referees shortened the first two quarters to 12 minutes each and halftime to just five minutes.

In the meantime, Doering was on the phone to a fast-food restaurant, arranging for the traditional Cal Lutheran postgame meal to be delayed several more hours and for the airline to hold its flight.

In the rush to get to the airport, one of the vans carrying the Cal Lutheran players wandered off course and arrived several minutes late.

Finally, at 8:10 p.m., all the Kingsmen were on a flight headed for Los Angeles and Doering breathed a sigh of relief.

It was a lost trip all around. Sonoma State won the game, 28-0.

THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL

Barring any filibusters, the Cal State Northridge’s women’s volleyball team will attempt to make an impact on the national polls this week during a busy trip to College Park, Md., and Washington, D.C.

The Matadors will play four matches in two days at two different venues, beginning Friday afternoon and concluding Saturday night.

And you thought the President had a busy schedule.

Northridge, which departs for Maryland today, originally was set to play all four matches in the Maryland tournament. But when Texas-Arlington dropped out, CSUN Coach Walt Ker asked the tournament host for another match.

“We wanted to have four matches,” Ker said. “If they’re strong teams, that’s fine because the reason we picked that tournament was to get a chance to play ranked teams.”

Northridge (8-5), an independent in its second season of Division I competition, will open the tournament Friday with matches against Southwest Missouri State (6-9) at 10 a.m. and Maryland (8-6) at 4 p.m. Both opponents reached the NCAA playoffs last year.

Northridge will conclude tournament play Saturday with a 3 p.m. match against Hofstra (10-8) and then drive 15-20 minutes into Washington to play Georgetown (12-7) in a nonconference match at 5.

And if the Hofstra match should run late?

“We hope that doesn’t happen,” Ker said.

SCORING MACHINE

Rachel Wackerman, a forward on Cal Lutheran women’s soccer team, is well on her way to breaking the school record for goals in a season.

The current standard: 30, a mark she set last season as a freshman when she finished second in the nation in goals scored.

Wackerman has 18 goals in the Regals’ 11 games this season. At that pace (1.63 goals per game), she will break her record before the end of the regular season.

Wackerman’s scoring also should keep Cal Lutheran (9-2, 6-0) on pace to win the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference championship.

“Rachel is a very good athlete,” Cal Lutheran Coach George Kuntz said. “She can run forever.”

And usually to a place where she can receive a pass and fake out a goalie.

Wackerman tied her own single-game record by scoring four goals in Cal Lutheran’s 5-1 win over Whittier last month. Wackerman hit the four-goal mark three times last season. Wackerman already holds the Cal Lutheran career record for goals with 48.

Wackerman helped South Pasadena High to win the Southern Section 2-A Division championship her senior year, but her scoring potential went unnoticed.

She broke a leg her junior year in high school and she played midfield her senior year, leaving the goals to front-line teammates.

At Cal Lutheran, Wackerman is happy to be back where the action is--and in the scoring ranks. “I like being up front, that’s really my position,” she said.

BEST-LAID PLANS

Armando Valdivia, a sophomore midfielder, has been considered among the brightest prospects in the Northridge soccer program since coming to CSUN out of Ridgecrest Burroughs High in 1990.

But with a host of seniors on this season’s Matador team, Coach Marwan Ass’ad planned to redshirt Valdivia and have him available for the next three years.

One game into the season, Ass’ad’s plans changed. Entering Saturday night’s match against visiting Westmont (11-1), the 5-foot-8, 150-pound Valdivia leads Northridge (6-4) with six assists and is third in overall scoring with 10 points.

“(Valdivia) is a tiger out there and that’s the kind of players we want to play,” Ass’ad said. “Before he leaves CSUN, he will be an All-American.”

NO DIFFERENCE

To Bob Burt, Northridge’s football coach, the idea of the Matadors playing in a Division I-AA cost-containment conference sounds like status quo.

“We’ve been living in a cost-containment Division II, so what’s the difference?” Burt asked. “I do know that if we go Division I-AA, we have to have more scholarship money, cost-containment or not. We can’t be competitive with Division I schools without some full rides.”

THE HARDER THEY FALL

It is probably fair to say that most football coaches in the Western State Conference are not feeling much compassion for either Bakersfield or Glendale this season.

The Renegades and Vaqueros lost a total of one conference game last season while rolling to the Southern and Northern division titles, respectively. They both lost Saturday to bring their combined season records to 1-5.

MR. CONSISTENCY

When he’s up, he’s way up. And when he’s down, he’s way down.

That’s the best way to describe the play of Ventura quarterback Matt Brimigion this season.

Brimigion has completed 35 of 74 passes for 458 yards and four touchdowns, but 380 yards and all four touchdowns came in a 49-47 victory over West L. A. two weeks ago.

In the Pirates’ losses to El Camino (50-7) and Valley (39-0), Brimigion completed a total of 13 passes for 78 yards. He threw three interceptions.

COACHING INSTINCT

Glendale football Coach John Cicuto might have made a mistake when he decided to gamble on fourth and seven at the L.A. Southwest 45-yard line late in the first half of the Vaqueros’ 31-6 loss Saturday.

L.A. Southwest took over with 1 minute 4 seconds to go and scored with eight seconds left to make it 15-0 at the half.

Cicuto has been coaching football at Glendale for 16 years. Last season, his second as the Vaqueros’ head coach, Cicuto guided Glendale to a 9-2 record and the Southern California Bowl championship. One thing he has learned is that success and second-guessing don’t often mix.

So after first telling reporters how he thought he needed to be less emotional when deciding whether to gamble on fourth down, Cicuto stopped and delivered a response as honest as it was refreshing.

“Actually, I’ll probably still go for it,” Cicuto said, looking ahead to a similar situation.

MOUNTAIN MEN

The Pierce College football team is off to a 2-1 start--its best since 1984--and Coach Bill Norton said that his offensive line has had as much to do with that success as any unit on the team.

The line, which averages 6-feet-4, 278 pounds, has four returning starters in tackles Mike Difonzo (6-4, 290) and Bobby Kyman (6-6, 285), guard Charles Gietzen (6-5, 310) and center Corey Alter (6-2, 255), and a returning part-time player in guard Dan Erickson (6-2, 250).

“We haven’t put a lot of points on the board,” Norton said. “But what we’re doing good on offense is keeping the ball away from the opposition, and that is a credit to our line. Our defense is doing a good job of coming in and forcing the other team to punt after three downs, and then the offense takes over and runs off eight, or 10, or 12 plays.

“We don’t always score, but we run some time off the clock.”

BY COMPARISON

If her performance in last Saturday’s Stanford cross-country invitational is any indication, Deena Drossin of Arkansas appears to have a good chance at earning All-American honors in this year’s NCAA Division I championships in Tucson, Nov. 25.

The freshman from Agoura High timed 16 minutes 56 seconds over the 5,000-meter course to place fifth in the invitational race, leading the Razorbacks to a 52-59 victory over Oregon.

Darcy Arreola ran the same time for Cal State Northridge at Stanford last season, and Arreola went on to finish 12th in the Division I championships in Knoxville, Tenn.

A RUNNING TAB

Drossin led a slew of former Valley-area standouts who ran for various schools at Stanford.

Tiffany York, a teammate of Drossin’s at Agoura, placed 31st (17:52) in the women’s race for UC Irvine, and Jeannie Rothman of Stanford--and formerly of Westlake High--finished 40th in 18:10. In the men’s invitational race, Peter Oviatt of Humboldt State clocked 24:50 over the five-mile course to finish 21st, Neff McGhie of Fresno State placed 29th in 25:01, and Eliazar Herrera of UCLA placed 37th in 25:07. Oviatt is a 1988 graduate of Agoura, McGhie a 1986 graduate of Simi Valley, and Herrera a 1990 graduate of Hoover.

Ron Twersky and staff writers Theresa Munoz, John Ortega and Wendy Witherspoon contributed to this notebook.

A look at last week’s top performers from area colleges.

PASSING

Player Att. Com. Yds. TD Marty Washington, AV 22 13 293 2 Mike McMullen, Glen. 23 9 138 0 Chris Gadomski, Valley 15 5 135 2 Eric Kiesau, Glendale 16 11 114 1

RUSHING

Player TC Yds TD Johnel Turner, Moorpark 18 203 3 LaShante Parker, Pierce 13 110 0 Arie McQuaig, Pierce 21 85 0 Greg Graham, AV 8 84 1

RECEIVING

Player Rec. Yds TD Keith West, Glendale 7 84 0 Joe Wade, Glendale 5 65 0 Cassidy O’Sullivan, CLU 5 20 0 Thomas Reimer, AV 4 72 0