UC Riverside Stays on High Road With a No. 3 Ranking in Baseball

After a third-place finish in NCAA Division II last season, the UC Riverside baseball team has carried its success into this season.

The Highlanders, who are 23-11 overall and lead the California Collegiate Athletic Assn. with an 11-4 record at the halfway mark in conference play, are ranked No. 3 in Division II.

Riverside held the conference lead by winning two of three games against Cal State Dominguez Hills last week. Cal Poly San Luis Obispo is second in the CCAA at 8-4 and Dominguez Hills is third at 7-5.

The Highlanders expect to receive a difficult conference test when they visit San Luis Obispo for a three-game series Friday and Saturday. The teams will play a doubleheader Saturday.

With most of their top players returning from last year’s team, which went 38-25-1, this was supposed to be another good season for the Highlanders.

Riverside has maintained its success behind a well-balanced offense and solid pitching.

The Highlanders have a team batting average of .303, with six starters batting at .306 or higher. Junior shortstop Jeff Waymire is hitting .390, and junior first baseman Chad Townsend (.321) leads the team with 11 home runs and 44 RBIs.

Riverside has received excellent pitching from starters Daron Kirkreit, Bill Jordan and Ron Cody, who have a combined record of 17-4. Kirkreit, a 6-foot-6 sophomore, has a 7-2 record and 2.06 earned-run average.

The Highlanders have received steady relief from freshman Richard Guerrero, who has a 2.95 ERA and four saves in 12 appearances.

The Cal Lutheran baseball team has been producing runs in eye-popping fashion in its first season in the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.

In building a 12-0 conference record and a three-game lead over Redlands in the conference standings, the Kingsmen have outscored their opponents, 163-18, including a 17-2 victory over Pomona-Pitzer last week.

The only inning in which the Kingsmen have been outscored in conference play is the ninth, by a 4-3 margin. But most of Cal Lutheran’s games have been decided long before the ninth.

The Kingsmen have also posted an impressive team batting average of .383 in conference play and an 0.97 ERA. Outfielder Darrell McMillin has provided much of the offense with a .488 average, along with six home runs and 16 RBIs in SCIAC play. Pitcher Steve Dempsey is 4-0 with an 0.33 ERA in the conference.

The Kingsmen have dominated all their opponents, not only conference foes.

Cal Lutheran, which is 26-1 overall and has moved up to No. 1 in this week’s NCAA Division III rankings released by the American Baseball Coaches Assn., has outscored its opponents, 290-52, and the Kingsmen have a team batting average of .335 and an ERA of 2.11.

McMillin, a junior, has led the way with a .402 batting average, 15 homers and 35 RBIs. He hit his 15th in the first inning of his team’s 16-4 victory over Pomona-Pitzer last week to break the school’s single-season record for home runs.

The only loss for Cal Lutheran this season has been a 5-3 setback to UC San Diego on March 27. San Diego is ranked No. 8 in Division III at 15-3-1.

Perennial NAIA track power Azusa Pacific had a big day Saturday at the sixth annual Golden State Athletic Conference track and field championships at Azusa.

The Cougars won their sixth consecutive men’s championship and second women’s title in a row. The men finished with 187 points, 53 ahead of runner-up Point Loma Nazarene, and the women outdistanced Point Loma, 137-115.

Leading the way was senior Benjamin Koech, who easily won both the long jump and triple jump. Koech posted meet-record marks of 51 feet 4 in the triple jump and 24-9 in the long jump.

Azusa Pacific’s Vince Bersford won the pole vault with a meet record of 17-1, and twin brothers Osmond and Davidson Ezinwa finished 1-2 in the 100-meter dash. Osmond won in 10.60 seconds, with Davidson second at 10.68.

The Cougars, who have won eight of the last nine NAIA titles, will be one of the favorites again when the nationals are held in May.

In the women’s division of the conference meet, the Cougars were led by distance runner Jenee Ellis with a meet record of 10:05.90 in the 3,000-meter run. The Cougars finished fifth in the NAIA women’s meet last year.

Defending NCAA Division II women’s tennis champion Cal Poly Pomona has not faced much of a challenge in building a 9-0 record and earning the top ranking in the division.

But the Broncos should receive their most difficult test of the season when they host the Xenia Anastasiadou Memorial Tennis Invitational from Friday through Sunday in Pomona.

All eight of the teams competing are ranked in the Volvo Tennis Division II top 20. In addition to Pomona, the field includes No. 2 Abilene Christian of Texas, No. 5 UC Davis, No. 7 Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, No. 8 Florida Southern, No. 9 Cal State Los Angeles, No. 12 Cal State Bakersfield and No. 16 Sonoma State.

Pomona opens tournament play against Sonoma State at 1 p.m. Friday. The championship match is at 9 a.m. Sunday.

College Division Notes

Azusa Pacific baseball Coach Tony Barbone recently posted his 200th career victory with a 17-0 decision over Montclair State of New Jersey. Barbone is 205-116 for a .639 winning percentage. The Cougars, ranked 19th in the NAIA, are 18-9 this season and lead the Golden State Athletic Conference at 7-3.

Greg Armbrust, a former NAIA All-America soccer selection at Azusa Pacific who also played for the U.S. National Team, has been named men’s soccer coach at Point Loma Nazarene. Armbrust, 26, was an assistant coach at Azusa Pacific from 1988-90.

LeCharls McDaniel, an assistant special teams coach for the San Diego Chargers the last two seasons and a former football player at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, has been named defensive back coach at the school. McDaniel also played with the Washington Redskins and New York Giants from 1981-85.

Goalkeeper Dave Salzwedel became the first from Cal Lutheran to play professional soccer when he signed a contract with the San Francisco Blackhawks of the American Professional Soccer League. Salzwedel, a two-time NAIA All-America selection, posted an 0.96 goals-against average and 30 shutouts with the Kingsmen from 1986-89.

In addition to top-ranked Cal Lutheran, two other teams from the SCIAC are listed in this week’s NCAA Division III baseball poll. Redlands is 25th with a 12-8-1 record and La Verne is No. 30 at 15-10.