Technically, Olsson Gets a Hat Trick

The conversation was short, and so was the time Saugus High boys’ basketball Coach Eric Olsson spent on the sideline.

Olsson was called for three technical fouls and ejected 3 minutes 40 seconds into the Centurions’ opening-round game of the Ventura tournament Monday. Saugus wound up losing to Channel Islands, 49-48.

What did Olsson do to warrant the early exit? In his own words:

“Channel Islands was setting a lot of illegal screens, so I told the ref to watch for that, and he hit me with the first technical,” Olsson said. “Then I said, ‘Wow, you’re in a bad mood, what’s wrong with you?’ And he hit me with another.

“While he was walking away, I said to my assistant, ‘That guy has a chip on his shoulder.’ He overheard me and gave me the third one. Before I knew it, I was in the locker room.”

Ventura Coach Dan Larson had a more succinct view: “He got one, he wouldn’t keep quiet, he got another, then another and then he was gone.”

Olsson is in his first season as the Centurions’ coach after several years as an assistant. Saugus is off to a disappointing start, and Olsson believes he cost the team a win with the ejection.

“The loss was my fault,” he said. “It was just one of those times when you have a stubborn referee and a stubborn coach. I really don’t think I deserved (the technical fouls), but I take the blame for what happened.”

DOUBLE DUTY

There is no truth to the rumor that North Hollywood girls’ Coach Rich Allen was auditioning for employment at Arkansas Baptist College when the Huskies played games in two different tournaments Dec. 26.

Because of commitments made a year ago, North Hollywood found itself scheduled to play in the first round of the Bell-Jeff tournament at 9:30 a.m. and in the ninth-place final of the Simi Valley tournament at 2 p.m.

The Huskies beat Santa Monica, 57-36, and left Bell-Jeff at 10:45 a.m. After a lunch stop at a fast-food restaurant, North Hollywood arrived in Simi Valley at 12:30 p.m. for its game against Culver City.

“There was my team, laid out on the bleachers taking naps,” Allen said. “That must have looked real intimidating.”

Against Culver City, North Hollywood led, 35-30, after three quarters before fatigue caught up with the Huskies. They were outscored, 19-9, in the fourth quarter for a 49-44 loss.

“I wanted to joke with them afterward and say, ‘Let’s go, we’ve got another game at 8 o’clock tonight,’ ” Allen said.

WE’RE NO. 1

The Reseda boys’ basketball team might have stumbled, bumbled and fumbled, but for now, the Regents (3-6) are lords of their domain.

Reseda defeated Taft in a Northwest Valley Conference opener Dec. 11, the lone conference game played to date. Conference action will resume Jan. 20 with all eight teams scheduled to play.

Until then, Reseda reigns supreme.

“We may be (3-6), but we’ll be in first place for six weeks,” Coach Jeff Halpern cracked.

SUCCESSOR?

The Hart quarterback position is among the most visible in the area.

This season, Davis Delmatoff was the latest in a long line of record-setting passers at the school.

The school’s next quarterback might be Mike Kocicka, a strong-armed junior who recently transferred from Crescenta Valley when his family moved to the Santa Clarita Valley.

The 6-foot-3, 190-pound Kocicka (pronounced ko-SEE-ka) quit the Falcons early this season after disputes with the coaching staff over playing time.

With Delmatoff graduating this spring, the quarterback position seems to be wide open.

“I really haven’t had a chance to talk with (Kocicka) yet, we’ll just have to wait and see what happens,” Hart Coach Mike Herrington said. “We feel there are already people here who can play the position, but we always give talented people the chance to play.”

POSTSEASON AWARDS

The Montclair Prep football team has been selected the state’s Division IV team of the year by Cal-Hi Sports. Montclair Prep finished 13-0 and defeated Bishop Diego, 35-7, in the Southern Section Division IX final earlier this month. Cal-Hi selects and ranks teams in five divisions, largely based on enrollment.

Running back Eliel Swinton finished second in the state in rushing with 2,384 yards. Jeff Byrd of Garden Grove Rancho Alamitos led state backs with 2,576 yards, an Orange County record. Swinton’s total set a San Fernando Valley single-season mark.

BASKETBALL BREAKFAST

It has not been much of a winter break for the Faith Baptist basketball team.

The Contenders played three consecutive games in the Hart tournament--on Saturday, Monday and Tuesday--with tip-off times at 9 a.m.

Players were asked to meet at 7:15 at Faith Baptist’s Canoga Park campus, where they boarded a bus and drove to the Hart campus in Newhall. The gym has been cold, and so have the Contenders.

“(Guard) James DeCarriere said he can’t get warmed up until the second half,” Faith Baptist assistant Greg Weiss said. “We don’t seem to play well until the second half.”

Half a game does not a victory make. After losing its first two games, though, the Contenders found an opponent that also has had trouble finding the accelerator. Faith Baptist beat Littlerock, 79-53, in the third round.

Each team scored 11 points in the first quarter.

UP AND DOWN

Greg Hayes has been scratching his head a lot lately.

The Canyon basketball coach is having problems figuring out his team’s erratic play. The Cowboys look formidable one game and factitious the next.

“Our desire is really inconsistent,” Hayes said. “The desire has always been very consistent in my 11 years here, but not this season. I’m just not used to that.”

Some observers have tried to attribute the team’s play to inexperience. Hayes, however, does not subscribe to the theory.

“We do have a lot of young guys, but young teams have played well in the past,” he said. “I just have to figure out how to get everyone to concentrate and play up to their abilities every game.”

UPGRADED

Palmdale is off to its best start in years, and the surprises keep coming.

Last Saturday, Palmdale beat Arroyo Grande, 49-45, in the first round of the Hart tournament.

Small feat? Not to Coach Garry Phelps. It was the first time in five years the Falcons won in the opening round of the tournament.

“It’s close by for us, it’s not a bad gym, but for some reason we’ve just never played well in this tournament,” Phelps said. “I don’t know why. At least now maybe we’ve got the monkey off our backs.”

EASY SUMMER

After competing in both the U.S. Olympic Trials and the World Junior (age 19 and under) championships last season, Marion Jones of Thousand Oaks expects to take it relatively easy this season, concluding her season in the state championships.

“I’m not going to run track over the summer,” Jones said. “I’m just going to play basketball and visit some of my relatives in Central America.”

Jones’ mother, Marion Toler, was born in Belize.

MOTIVATIONAL TACTICS

There is a saying among runners that you are only as good as your last race, and no one understands that better than Hoover senior Margarito Casillas.

Casillas won Division I titles in both the state and Southern Section championships this year, but his disappointing 48th-place finish in the Kinney West regional Dec. 5 put a damper on a season that began with 16 consecutive victories.

The top eight finishers in the West regional advanced to the Kinney national championships in San Diego, where Casillas had placed fifth as a junior.

“As far as I’m concerned, I didn’t have a good senior season,” Casillas said this week. “I felt like I was robbed. I didn’t do something that I should have done, so I’m going to come into track season kind of angry and frustrated. I’ll use that as motivation.”

GREAT EXPECTATIONS

No one can accuse Camarillo junior Jeremy Fischer or Harvard-Westlake senior Jesse Stern of not believing in himself.

At the Sunkist Invitational press conference each was asked about his goals for the upcoming track season, and each had eyebrow-raising answers.

Fischer, who cleared 6 feet 11 1/2 inches in the high jump as a sophomore, said he wanted to clear 7-3 this season and 7-6 as a senior.

Stern, who has a personal best of 15-4 in the pole vault, said he was shooting for a 17-foot vault by season’s end.

Stern placed fourth in the pole vault and Fischer tied for fourth in the high jump in the state championships in June.

David Coulson and staff writers Steve Elling, Paige A. Leech, John Ortega and Jason H. Reid contributed to this notebook.