Titan Gymnasts in the Hunt for Title

March Madness arrives. People clip the NCAA basketball tournament pairings out of the newspaper, scurry for the copier and organize office pools.

Yes, it’s time for men’s basketball, women’s basketball, first-round upsets, and . . .

Women’s gymnastics.

Postseason tournaments have arrived in other sports, too, and one of the more competitive will take place at Cal State Fullerton at 7:30 p.m. Saturday: the Big West Conference Gymnastics Championships.

The way Titan Coach Lynn Rogers figures it, there will be a three-way run at first place in Titan Gym this weekend between Fullerton, Utah State and UC Santa Barbara. Five conference schools field teams.

“To be honest, I think (Utah State) is deeper than we are,” Rogers said.

Utah State beat Fullerton by several tenths of a point in late February and the Titans edged UCSB a couple of weeks later, 189.05-186.4, although UCSB held out Emily Tripiano, its top all-around gymnast, for disciplinary reasons.

A plus for the Titans is the return of Brandi Baldasano, who has been out for the last month with a broken finger. Rogers expects Baldasano to return Saturday, although her duty will be limited.

“That will give us a boost,” Rogers said.

Still, Rogers will guard against over-extending Baldasano because according to his master plan, Saturday’s championships are only a blip on the radar screen.

“Even though we’d like to win the conference meet, I think in reality we’re setting our sights toward regionals,” Rogers said. “I think this team has an outside shot at the NCAA finals.”

The Titans are ranked 18th nationally and, the key is, only about one point separates the teams ranked 12th through 18th, in average meet scores.

“If we can get Brandi back in our lineup, that will be a difference of maybe two points in our team score,” Rogers said.

The NCAA regionals are April 3 at Oregon State and the NCAA national championships are April 15-17, also at Oregon State.

“It’s been a good season,” said Rogers, who gained his 200th coaching victory this season. “It’s been our best in a long time in terms of how far the kids have come and how hard they have worked.

“They’ve been fun to coach.”

Attack of the Gummi Bears: They were everywhere. On the bench, in the players’ hands, in the players’ mouths. Red, green, orange--and Fullerton won twice.

Come again?

The Titan softball team, off to an 8-10 start, swept a doubleheader Sunday against Cal Poly Pomona. The key was that the Titans broke out of a hitting slump.

And they ended the slump when Coach Judi Garman threw a sack of Gummi Bears on the bench and announced that whoever got a hit was welcome to take a bear. And if a pitcher notched a strikeout, bears for the entire pitching staff.

Fullerton players collected 22 hits Sunday. And so the Gummi Bears will return Wednesday, when the Titans play host to Massachusetts.

“You better believe we’ll have more bears out there Wednesday,” Garman said. “I’m asking for an increase in my budget so we can afford them.

“Tell everybody that it’s ‘Bear Power.’ ”

No, we couldn’t. That would be too much to bear.

In addition to the major sugar rush, the Titan softball team also got a boost from another unexpected source: Transfer pitcher Jennifer Mortensen.

Mortensen, a transfer from Texas A&M;, became eligible last Wednesday and then took a no-hitter into the seventh inning Thursday against Cal State Long Beach before losing it.

“Not bad for one-day’s notice,” Garman said.

Mortensen was the winning pitcher against Long Beach but then lost Saturday at Nevada Las Vegas, 1-0, on an unearned run. So she is 1-1 with a nifty 1.08 earned-run average.

She became immediately eligible, without having to sit out a year, because Texas A&M; released her from her scholarship when it was learned that Mortensen’s grandfather had been diagnosed with cancer. Mortensen is from Torrance, where her grandfather lives.

The Titans also lost a pitcher recently. Senior Ann Van Dortrecht, who had been trying to come back from rotator cuff surgery and had not yet pitched, quit the team.

“She still wasn’t 100% and made the decision to pack it up,” Garman said. “We would have liked her to stick around. But there were a lot of questions when Jennifer became eligible if she would pitch again.”

Jack Bedell, Fullerton’s vice president in charge of personnel, was accused in a deposition last week of promoting the idea of firing former women’s volleyball Coach Jim Huffman during a meeting of athletic department officials. The idea allegedly was prompted by Huffman’s gender equity lawsuit against the school last year.

Former associate Athletic Director Steve DiTolla’s testimony could be damaging evidence against the school in Jim Huffman’s $2.1-million wrongful termination suit.

According to Jared Huffman, Jim Huffman’s attorney and brother, DiTolla testified as to Bedell’s anger at a meeting last March 20, the day a court issued a preliminary injunction blocking the school’s attempt to drop women’s volleyball.

DiTolla testified that, at a meeting attended by DiTolla, Bedell, Senior Women’s Administrator Maryalyce Jeremiah and Athletic Director Bill Shumard, Bedell said, “We’ve got to fire that so-and-so as soon as possible. He’s caused enough aggravation.”

Opinion: Three cheers for the Orange County district attorney for throwing out the complaint against Nevada Las Vegas Coach Rollie Massimino filed by Albert Ogrudski of Cerritos.

Ogrudski alleged that Massimino punched him in the aftermath of the Titans’ upset of UNLV in a men’s basketball game a couple of weeks ago.

Massimino denied it and there was no definitive videotape, so the D.A. declined to press charges.

It is highly unlikely that Massimino would haul off and intentionally slug a fan in an opponent’s gym when much of the crowd has stormed the court and is wildly celebrating. Among other things, it could provoke a riot.

And if he did, you can bet he was provoked. At least one out-of-control fan charged Massimino seconds after the final buzzer, wagged his finger in the coach’s face and screamed several obscenities.

Besides, if Ogrudski was hit, he was the one who put himself in that situation. Fullerton campus police could have charged him with trespassing.

Yes, it is traditional for fans to storm the court after a monumental victory. But what has to be clear here is this:

If you go onto the court, you had better leave your mitts off of the visiting team and coaches; and, you go onto the court at your own risk, knowing full well that a frenzied scene such as that could lead to a poke in the head or an elbow in the ribs.

Trying to press charges against a school or an individual in a situation like that is like slamming your hand in the car door and blaming the car dealer.

Titan Notes

Forward Kim Kemp was the only starter on the men’s basketball team not to average double-figures in scoring. Kemp finished at 9.9 points per game. The kicker? Had he made one more free throw this season, he would have been at 10.0 . . . The baseball team is ranked seventh in this week’s Baseball America poll and 12th in the Collegiate Baseball poll . . . Assistant sports information director Cindy Walton turned in her resignation on Monday. She is moving on to become the director of sports information for the American Volleyball Coaches’ Assn. in Colorado Springs, Colo.