Lagattuta Signs to Play at Nevada

Rico Lagattuta of Westlake High signed a letter of intent Thursday to play baseball next season at Nevada.

Lagattuta, a left-handed pitcher and first baseman who was a late-round selection of the San Diego Padres in the June amateur draft, earned a scholarship with a solid all-around performance in a tournament played at the Nevada baseball complex last month.

Lagattuta, playing for the Westlake-Royal American Legion team, was named the most valuable player in the Sierra Nevada Classic tournament. Lagattuta was 10 for 19 with eight runs batted in and won two games as a pitcher in the tournament, leading Westlake-Royal to the championship.

Lagattuta is 5-0 for Westlake-Royal with an earned-run average of 3.43. He has 45 strikeouts in 30 1/3 innings and is batting .397.

Lagattuta is expected to be used as a pitcher and recently had his fastball clocked at 90 m.p.h. on a radar gun, Westlake-Royal Coach Mike McClure said. Lagattuta plans to room with Royal High product Shane Slayton, a catcher who also has signed to play next season at Nevada. Slayton also plays for Westlake-Royal.

Four water polo players from the Buena High program participated on a team that won a Junior Olympics qualifying tournament over the weekend in Orange County.

John Lory, Dan Slaton, Dan Hops and Phil Mueller, all of whom played for the Buena varsity last season as sophomores, were members of a team composed of players from throughout the Channel League.

The team, for players age 15 and under, advanced to a tournament on Aug. 3-8 in Fort Lauderdale.

Information: 805-642-8041.

Mike Andry of Chaminade High has given an oral commitment to play baseball next season at Michigan State. Andry, a catcher, batted .342 with 16 RBIs last spring and is a recruited walk-on.

Catcher Mike Shwartzer of the Woodland Hills Astros led the team to a third-place finish in the National Baseball Congress Western Regional last week in San Diego. Shwartzer, a Reseda High product, was nine for 18 with two homers, two doubles, a triple and drove in 11 runs in four games.

Several Camarillo High teams will be led by new coaches next year. Dennis Riedmiller was named boys’ track coach, replacing Mike Smith, who resigned. Riedmiller formerly was the girls’ track coach and assisted in specialty areas including the high jump.

Ron Wilson, former wrestling coach at Oxnard High, was selected to serve as wrestling coach at Camarillo, replacing Tim McCarthy, who resigned.

Glenn Fischer, former assistant boys’ soccer coach for Camarillo, will move to head coach, replacing John Alfino, who resigned.

Scott Cline, a Camarillo graduate and a former UCLA standout in baseball, will assist in football and baseball. Cline is a math teacher at Camarillo.

Cedric Ceballos of the Phoenix Suns will star in the first Cedric Ceballos Alumni Game on Aug. 29 at Ventura College.

During his basketball career at Ventura, Ceballos led the Pirates to two conference championships and a state championship. He led the state in scoring and in rebounding his sophomore year.

The game will include other former Ventura players and will be preceded by a barbecue dinner. Proceeds from the event will benefit the Ventura College men’s basketball program and the Boys’ and Girls’ Club of Ventura.

The Cal State Northridge women’s track and field team has signed 800-meter specialists Celina Gaskin of Rialto and Kendra Ossey of Hawthorne.

Gaskin, a 5-foot-5 junior transfer from Riverside Community College and a graduate of Eisenhower High, has a personal best of 2 minutes 16.28 seconds in the 800. Ossey, 5-4, a 1992 graduate of Hawthorne High, has a personal best of 2:14.86 in the 800 in addition to a 56.5 in the quarter-mile.