Move to SCC Helps Sharpen Her Skills

In the softball pitching circle, Beth Howard has remarkable control.

She hits the target well with any of a baffling array of pitches.

Need proof?

In 147 innings this season, Howard has walked only 13 batters for Southern California College.

But Howard is still doing what she does best athletically only because she changed the course of her life, which she believed wasn’t headed in the right direction.

Nothing was going seriously awry; Howard was just unhappy. She was on a full softball scholarship at Oregon State. The team was struggling against tough Pacific 10 Conference competition and Howard was struggling in the impersonal major-college environment.

So after a sophomore season that was lost because of a broken finger, Howard returned home to Cypress, set on giving up softball.

“I wasn’t really happy, and I decided I’d rather be happy than to have school paid for and be miserable,” she said.

After briefly attending Long Beach City College late last summer, Howard enrolled at SCC. She had met SCC coaches earlier in the summer while playing with an Athletes in Action club team, and was attracted to the school’s Christian ideals and small class sizes.

At SCC, softball is fun again for Howard, who hopes to graduate in 1995 with a degree in sports science. She finished the regular season 16-8 with a 1.00 earned-run average and helped the Vanguards win the Golden State Athletic Conference title.

More importantly, she feels as if she’s part of a team again.

“I think the big difference is support within the team,” Howard said. “There aren’t any cliques. It’s one team. No one is talking behind anyone’s back.

“I had a friend tell me the other night that she really likes talking to me now because I’m a lot more positive.”

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Good home: The Vanguards have a distinct advantage in the NAIA District 3 playoffs they are playing host to Friday and Saturday. Top-seeded SCC (37-17-2) is undefeated in 20 games at home this season.

“That’s an advantage ,” SCC co-Coach Terry Zeigler said, laughing. “I just think we are comfortable playing at home. We have a nice field and the kids are comfortable playing on it.”

A further bonus is that the Vanguards have won three of four games this season against the second- and third-seeded teams, Azusa Pacific (37-13) and Cal Baptist (21-20).

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Softball honors: Zeigler and fellow SCC co-Coach Bekki Turner were named District 3 co-coaches of the year. Zeigler is a 1983 graduate of Chapman. Turner is a 1990 graduate of Nichols (La.) State.

Junior catcher Renee Hernandez was named the district player of the year. Hernandez, who played at Los Amigos High, batted .295 and led the district in home runs with three. She scored 28 runs and drew 40 walks and was the district’s top defensive catcher.

Pitcher Shannon Saylor and outfielders Carrie Nelson and Stephanie Wills also were named first-team all-district from the Vanguards. Howard, shortstop Cherylynn Gordon and third baseman Shannon Moreno were second-team selections. Saylor, Hernandez, Wills and Nelson were named to the all-conference team.

Christ College Irvine catcher LaSondra Kellum, who led the district with a .471 batting average, was the Eagles’ only first-team all-district pick. Pitcher Stephanie Viola was a second-team selection. Kellum made the all-conference team.

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It’s almost over: Chapman will finish its final Division I baseball season against USC Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Saturday’s game (1 p.m.) will be at Hart Park.

The Panthers (21-30), who played .500 ball for the first two months of the season, struggled in April, losing 14 of 19 games. During that stretch, they had a 13-game losing streak against Division I opponents, which they finally broke with a 10-8 victory over Grand Canyon Saturday in Phoenix.

First-year Coach Gary Henderson said it has been a difficult season for his players, many of whom joined the program when the university offered athletic scholarships. Several players are still receiving partial scholarships, but most of them have had sub-par seasons.

Three who transferred to Chapman this year, after the university’s decision to drop to Division III, have been pleasant surprises. First baseman Octavio Medina is leading the team in batting at .325, followed by utility player Abijah Alastra at .315. Brian Green dropped below .300 to .296 in a loss to San Diego Tuesday.

“Those three guys came here understanding what they were getting into and I don’t think there’s any question that that is a vital reason for their success,” Henderson said.

Henderson said he and his staff have been trying to remain upbeat.

“What we’ve done recently is be as positive as possible,” he said. “We’ve got some guys coming back who are pretty good players and I don’t want them to think that this is a bad place to be.”

Notes

The Chapman softball team, which is 23-22 and 8-12 in the California Collegiate Athletic Assn., will finish its season Friday and Saturday in a CCAA round-robin tournament at Cal State Dominguez Hills. . . . Christ College Irvine pitcher Mike Crumrine was named the Golden State Athletic Conference player of the week for the second consecutive week. Crumrine pitched his third consecutive complete game, allowing five hits and one earned run in a victory over SCC. . . . SCC’s Jenny Caruso, who was four for six and had three runs, two runs batted in and two stolen bases in three Vanguard victories, was named the district and conference player of the week.