City to Retain Its Schedule of 17 Conference Baseball Games

Compromise prompted alterations in the original proposal, but the City Section nonetheless voted Tuesday to reinstitute the 17-game conference baseball season in the spring.

With some not-so-minor changes, the Interscholastic Athletics Committee authorized the 17-game schedule, which over the summer had been trimmed to 10 games because of budget cuts within the Los Angeles Unified School District.

In the process, two nonleague games--included in the proposal that was first submitted--were eliminated from the pre-conference schedule by IAC.

While IAC didn’t approve the 17-game schedule in its original form, City Section Commissioner Hal Harkness claimed the primary mission was accomplished.

“What we really wanted was to keep the (17-game) schedule intact,” Harkness said. “We were able to do that.”

Teams, which remain eligible to compete in preseason tournaments, will begin conference play either March 23 or 24, Harkness said.

As part of a cost-cutting measure aimed at reducing transportation costs, the City initially cut the baseball schedule to 10 conference games.

San Fernando Coach Steve Marden and other area coaches then proposed an alternate plan in which teams would continue to play the 17-game conference schedule as well as two nonleague games in the preseason.

Under this plan, baseball and tennis transportation were coordinated to save funds.

The junior varsity baseball schedule was cut from 17 conference games to 14 in Marden’s proposal.

On Tuesday, IAC voted to institute a 17-game junior varsity schedule as well and trimmed the two nonleague games from the preseason.

Marden said he was disappointed that the nonleague games were eliminated for the varsity and that his original proposal became bogged down in bureaucracy.

Marden said the City asked him to help conduct a survey of City junior varsity coaches.

Marden said that of the 33 coaches to respond, 32 favored a 14-game conference JV schedule.