O.C. Swimmers Ready to Defend Section Titles

The Southern Section Swimming Championships will be held at the Belmont Plaza Pool in Long Beach, beginning today with the Division I preliminaries at 11 a.m., followed by the Division II preliminaries at 5 p.m. The Division III preliminaries are noon Friday.

The finals begin with the Division I at 7 p.m. Friday, Division III on Saturday at noon and Division II at 7 p.m. Saturday.

Defending champions in Division I include El Dorado’s Kella Hoblick (200 individual medley, 2 minutes 4.29 seconds; 100 breaststroke, 1:04.84), El Toro’s Michelle Perry (100 freestyle, 51.60) and John Simmons (100 backstroke, 50.18). Mission Viejo, the defending team champion, is seeking its 16th title under Coach Don Pelton.

In Division II, sophomore diver Sandy Zubrin of Corona del Mar (464.85 points) is the lone defending individual champion, but the Brea-Olinda girls’ team is seeking its third consecutive title under Coach Phyllis Curry.

The diving competition, held at Heritage Park in Irvine, continues today with the Division III preliminaries and finals (girls at 12:30 p.m., boys at 3:30) and Friday with the Division II preliminaries and finals (girls at 12:30 p.m., boys at 3:30).

Swimming and diving team points will be combined to determine divisional team champions.

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Postseason track and field competition begins this week, with four divisional preliminary meets on the schedule.

The Division III preliminaries begin at 4 p.m. Friday at Trabuco Hills High School. On Saturday, the Division I meet starts at noon at Trabuco Hills, Division II begins at noon at UC Riverside, and Division IV starts at noon at Arcadia High School.

The preliminaries will qualify nine finalists in each of 15 girls’ and 15 boys’ events for the Southern Section Divisional Championship meet May 22.

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Betty Ann Boeving of Danville Monte Vista High School and Steven Park of San Marino High have been named the 1992-93 CIF Scholar-Athletes of the Year.

Boeving, who played basketball, volleyball and softball, will attend Oregon in the fall, and Park, who will enroll at Stanford, played baseball and football.

Finalists from the county were Capistrano Valley’s Darcy Stuart, Foothill’s Tad Heath and Corona del Mar’s Brian Walden.

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Designed to honor schools for outstanding sportsmanlike conduct during the 1992-93 school year, the 11th “Shake for Sportsmanship” awards will be presented at Dodger Stadium before the Dodger-Cincinnati Red game on May 19.

The honored schools were selected by a vote of their peers--members of their respective leagues--using their criteria. Guidelines from the CIF Office include participation, enthusiasm, behavior at games, treatment of opponents and contest officials. This is to include the actions of competitors, school band members, drill teams, pep squads, cheerleaders and student-rooting sections.

The winning schools and their leagues: Liberty Christian (Academy), Foothill (Century), Cypress (Empire), Bethel Baptist (Express), La Habra (Freeway), Rancho Alamitos (Garden Grove), Brethren Christian (Olympic), Anaheim (Orange), Century (Pacific Coast), Woodbridge (Sea View), Dana Hills (South Coast), Connelly (Sunrise) and Edison (Sunset).