Foothill’s Whitaker Cutting Back

Jerry Whitaker, a mainstay of high school cross-country and track and field at Foothill for 29 years, has relinquished some of his coaching duties, citing a need to devote more time to his personal interests.

Whitaker, 53, has resigned as head cross-country coach, and has turned over the program to assistant Matt Bell, a two-time State qualifier in the mile who competed for Whitaker and graduated in 1975. Whitaker will continue with the program as an assistant, and direct the track program this spring. He said he is unlikely to coach the track team beyond the 1995 season.

“The last four years I’ve been a teacher, athletic director, a coach and a landlord (of a San Clemente apartment complex),” Whitaker said. “The A.D. job is what I wanted to phase into when I got out of coaching. I got the opportunity to get into that, so I’ll cut back on the coaching. I have no regrets. A lot of guys and gals out there, I’ve been involved in their lives.”

Whitaker has coached cross-country since 1965. Since then, he has alternated as head or assistant coach of the track team.

Whitaker also has been meet director for the Orange County Championships since it began in 1967. It will continue under the direction of either the Foothill boosters or Woodbridge Coach George Varvas.

Whitaker’s teams won two Southern Section cross-country titles. The boys won the large-school title in 1979 and the girls won the Division III-AA championship in 1990, finishing second in the state. He was named coach of the year in 1979 and 1985 by the California Coaches Assn.

He was a 1991 recipient of the California Interscholastic Federation service award after spending nearly a decade on the Southern Section cross-country advisory council. He also was national vice chairman for track in the National High School Coaches Assn.

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Dana Hills was willing to change the date of its football game against University. The Dolphins, the home team, agreed to play the game Thursday, Sept. 23, instead of Friday, the first day of Yom Kippur. Moving the game allows University quarterback Dov Herbstman and center Andrew Silberfarb the opportunity to play football and celebrate the Jewish holiday.

A similar conflict developed for the Sept. 16 game against Laguna Hills, scheduled to be played on Rosh Hashanah. Laguna Hills, which uses Mission Viejo as a home site, was unable to change the game to Friday because Mission Viejo plays hosts to Irvine.

“Both schools did everything they could to accommodate us,” University Coach and Athletic Director Mark Cunningham said. “For Dana Hills to give up that Friday night was really great of them because the draw (of paying fans) isn’t as good (on a Thursday). That’s what high school athletics is all about, giving those kids an opportunity to play.”

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Turn on the radio: Among the small group of Edison High football supporters during the Chargers’ recent trip to Oahu was Kari Cates, who now lives in Honolulu.

Cates, 27, played on the Edison girls’ basketball team from 1981 to 1983 for current Charger football Coach Dave White and attended UC San Diego and Cal State Long Beach.

These days, Cates (who goes by the stage name of Kari Steele) co-hosts the top-rated morning drive radio show in Hawaii at Z 107.9. She also is the station’s news director, supplies traffic reports and is the “straight man” for the show’s star, Michael Qseng.

“We actually developed the show’s format at another station,” Cates said. “This (morning disc jockey) was the last thing I ever thought I would end up doing. I was just in the right place at the right time for the past three years.”

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Aliso Niguel cross-country Coach Rich Bellante hopes to show his athletes the bigger picture this year. He worked out an arrangement with Children’s Hospital of Mission Viejo and regularly will take athletes to the hospital to visit the kids there.

“I want to have them appreciate not only what they’re able to do, but also have them see themselves as part of a larger community,” Bellante said. “I’ve seen the success of this in the classroom--I do a learning service community component in the classroom all the time--and we want to send a message to kids about participation and appreciation for what they’re able to do.

“This is the kind of program we’re committed to building, and we have two coaches who want to create something special, and if we build the foundation, good things will come of that.”

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Lyle Porter, Mater Dei’s principal, was not in favor of the Orange County realignment proposal as it was presented to the Southern Section Releaguing Committee for the 1994-98 cycle. Afterward, he had this to say:

“If there is any reason to revisit this from a point of view of fairness, I would be very surprised if the Orange County Section is not in place before this next four-year cycle is up. I think at that time, depending on the governance of the organization, if they thought it needed it, they would restructure it. They could take this as is and say ‘We’ll stay with it,’ or they have the option of saying, ‘Gee, we’ll have had a year to look at it and if we think it needs changing, we’ll change it.’ ”

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It’s time again for county bragging rights in girls’ volleyball as the Orange County championships will be contested in three divisions, beginning at 8:30 a.m. Saturday, at Edison, Huntington Beach and Westminster high schools.

Corona del Mar returns to defend its Division I title, and Division II champion Huntington Beach will compete in the tournament, which features a new format designed to produce a better tournament, according to director Dennis Creighton.

Divisions I and II feature six pools of four teams each, with the first- and second-place teams in each pool advancing to the Division I playoffs at Edison and the third- and fourth-place teams competing in the Division II playoffs at Huntington Beach. Teams will play two out of three game matches with rally scoring in the third. Schools are guaranteed three matches in pool play and at least one in the playoffs, which begin about noon.

Capistrano Valley, Capistrano Valley Christian, Fountain Valley, Laguna Beach, Los Alamitos, Mater Dei, Mission Viejo and Newport Harbor are among the Division I and II competitors.

The Division III field features Kennedy, Valencia and Cypress, but 1992 champion Whittier Christian won’t defend its title.

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Don’t accuse the Newport Harbor girls’ volleyball team of having a cushy schedule. The second-ranked Sailors open against fifth-ranked Huntington Beach tonight, play No. 3 Laguna Beach two days later and participate in the county tournament Saturday. Less than two weeks later, the team plays Woodbridge Sept. 29, leaves the next day for a national tournament in Chicago, returns Oct. 4 and plays top-ranked Corona del Mar Oct. 5.