HIGH SCHOOL PREVIEW / BOYS’ TRACK AND FIELD : King Has Foot Soldiers to Keep Crown at Birmingham

Scott King, track coach at Birmingham High, finally can relax.

After 15 seasons as a head coach in the City Section, during which time he led his teams to three runner-up finishes, King last year produced a City champion.

“What happened last year is almost ancient history for a lot of the kids on this year’s team because they weren’t a big part of it,” King said. “They didn’t score points for us in the City meet. But for me, personally, it was a big relief. I don’t think there’s any doubt about that.”

The relief is evident in King’s voice and in the way he talks about this season. Birmingham will attempt to become the second team from the San Fernando Valley--Taft was the first in 1986-87--to win consecutive City titles in boys’ track.

Last year, even though the Braves were coming off a runner-up finish to Locke in the City finals and deserved their status as favorites, King was painfully cautious in his preseason assessment.

This year, a more relaxed King acknowledges the Braves have an excellent chance of repeating.

“I think this team is going to be similar to last year’s in that we’re not going to win the City title with just one or two big guys,” King said. “If we do it, it’s going to be like last year where we kind of nickel-and-dimed our way through.”

Birmingham, which has won 44 consecutive dual meets, scored points in 11 of 15 events in last year’s City championships to easily turn back Locke, 70-46, for the title.

Hurdler Raymond Banner and 400 specialist Mike Moguel graduated in June, but four athletes who accounted for 40 1/2 points in last year’s meet return.

Senior Alvaro Mejia won the 1,600 meters and placed third in the 3,200, and senior Tony Serpas finished second in the 100 and fifth in the 200 in addition to running legs on teams that placed third and fourth in the 400 and 1,600 relays, respectively.

Junior James Lincoln won the high jump with a then-personal best of 6 feet 8 inches, and he raised that mark to 6-9 in a season opener against Grant on Friday.

Lincoln also will compete in the 110 high hurdles, long jump and triple jump. He competed in those events in dual meets last year but devoted little time to them in practice. That will change.

“I think he wants to become more of an all-around performer this season,” King said.

Senior Adam Naftalin is the other returning scorer from last year’s team, having placed fifth in the 800.

Serpas, who has personal bests of 10.87 seconds in the 100 and 22.14 in the 200, could move up to the 400.

Junior Ismael Castellanos is expected to give Birmingham a solid one-two punch in the 800. Castellanos is moving up to the 800 after consistently running in the 52-second range in the 400 as a sophomore.

Senior Daniel Rideau is another potential scorer in the City meet. He won the B-level 300-meter intermediate hurdles in last year’s City championships, and he has a personal best of 21-6 in the long jump.

The talent on this year’s team, combined with the satisfaction of last year’s title, has King standing a little taller than in the past.

“I’m definitely having a lot of fun,” he said. “Winning last year took a big monkey off our backs.”

OTHER TEAMS TO WATCH

Agoura: The Chargers won their first Marmonte League title last year and several key performers return, led by distance ace Ryan Wilson.

Wilson, who won the state Division II cross-country title in November, placed fifth in the 1,600 in the state championships last year.

His personal best of 4 minutes 12.77 seconds in the 1,600 makes him the No. 2 returning runner in the nation in that event, and he also has timed 1:55.2 in the 800 and 9:23.5 in the 3,200.

“I’m shooting for the school record (4:09.32) in the mile this season,” said Wilson, who has taken recruiting trips to Arkansas, Georgetown and Villanova. “I haven’t really set any goals in the other events.”

Seniors Scott Mitchell and Sean Burns along with juniors Damon Blechen and Dave Schaeffer also are expected to play big roles.

Mitchell is the early favorite to win Marmonte League titles in the 100 and 200 after finishing third and second, respectively, last year.

Burns, the Southern Section Division I wrestling champion at 171 pounds, is the defending league champion in the triple jump.

Blechen placed second in the shotput and fifth in the discus in last year’s league meet, and he has personal bests of 50-8 and 143-0 in those events.

Schaeffer did not compete for the Chargers last year, but he threw 135-0 in the discus as a freshman.

Thousand Oaks: The Lancers finished second in last year’s Marmonte finals with a team dominated by non-seniors. They will be bolstered this year by several young and talented distance runners who propelled Thousand Oaks to a second-place finish in the 1992 state Division I cross-country championships.

Senior Marc Musitano, the defending league champion in the 110 high hurdles and the 300 intermediates, heads a list of five returning athletes who accounted for 56 of the Lancers’ 102 points in last year’s league finals.

Seniors Manfred Wagner (third in the shotput and discus), Brian Lowe (third in the pole vault) and Ryan Southwell (third in the triple jump, fourth in the long jump), and junior Zach Lee (second in the pole vault) are the others.

Senior Ryan Nugent (sixth in the 800 in last year’s league finals) and junior Brandon Del Campo (the 1992 frosh-soph league champion in the 1,600 and 3,200) are expected to lead a superb middle- and long-distance corps.

Hart: The Indians won their third consecutive state Division I cross-country title in November and several members of that team will help Hart in its quest to win a fifth consecutive Foothill League track title.

Senior Paul De La Cerda placed fifth in the 1,600 in last year’s Southern Section 4-A Division championships and has personal bests of 4:17.98 in that event and 1:54.6 in the 800.

Senior Keith Grossman has a personal best of 9:09.83 in the 3,200, and sophomore Brett Strahan, Hart’s top runner in the state cross-country championships, timed 4:22.16 in the 1,600 as a freshman.

Seniors Jason Medearis (personal best of 14.9 in the 110 hurdles), Deriek Charles (22-2 1/4 in the long jump, 42-0 1/4 in the triple jump) and Jared Halverson (6-2 in the high jump) should also figure prominently.

INDIVIDUALS TO WATCH

Drue Powell (Reseda): He placed third in the 110-meter high hurdles in last year’s state championships as a junior and has run 14.01 in the event. He was impressive in winning the 50-meter highs at the Sunkist Invitational last month.

Powell’s goal is to break the City record of 13.54 (converted from a hand time) set by Philip Johnson of Gardena in 1978.

He also will compete in 300 intermediates, long jump and triple jump.

Jeremy Fischer (Camarillo): He opened the outdoor season last week by clearing a personal best of 7-0 in the high jump.

Fischer was the Southern Section 3-A Division champion as a sophomore last year and hopes to improve on his disappointing tie for fourth in the state championships.

He also has a personal best of 21-8 in the long jump, an event in which he is the defending Ventura County champion.

Margarito Casillas (Hoover): The 1992 state Division I cross-country champion, Casillas placed seventh in the 3,200 meters in last year’s state track meet.

Too many races during dual-meet competition took their toll on Casillas toward the end of last season, but he and Coach Greg Switzer are not apt to make the same mistake.

Casillas’ personal best of 9:05.79 in the 3,200 makes him the No. 1 returner in the nation in that event.

Jesse Stern (Harvard-Westlake): The top performer on a Wolverine team that won the Southern Section 1-A Division title last year, Stern placed fourth in the pole vault in the state championships and has a personal best of 15-4.

Andre DeSaussure (Taft): The Southern Section 3-A Division champion in the 200 and 400 as a sophomore at Royal, DeSaussure is a legitimate contender for City titles in both events.

The order of running events on the City championship schedule is tight enough, however, that he might be forced to choose between the two.

Some observers have begun to compare DeSaussure to Quincy Watts, the Taft alum who won the 1992 Olympic title in the 400 meters.

Any comparison to Watts is premature and unfair to DeSaussure, though. Although DeSaussure ran 10.7 (hand-timed) in the 100, 21.90 in the 200 and 48.37 in the 400 last year, those times do not rival Watts’ best in the 100 (10.56) and 200 (20.97) as a sophomore.

Jeff Nadeau (Monroe): Nadeau almost single-handedly led the Vikings to a tie for fifth in last year’s City championships by placing second in the long jump and triple jump, and finishing third in the high jump.

He has personal bests of 6-8 in the high jump, 22-2 in the long jump and 44-3 in the triple jump.