VALLEY DIGEST

Taft Center’s Expulsion Blow to Title Hopes

The Taft High boys’ basketball team, expected to contend for the highly competitive West Valley League title, was dealt a blow Monday when center Johnny Williams was expelled from school.

Williams, a 6-foot-7 senior who was one of the region’s dominant players for the past two years, will be given an opportunity transfer to an undetermined City Section school for disciplinary reasons.

Williams was selected to the All-City Section 4-A Division and Times All-Valley teams last season. He averaged 18.2 points and 11.3 rebounds, both team highs, and led the league in blocked shots with 79.

Williams had been in hot water with Taft administrators several times over disciplinary matters.

“It was an accumulation of things,” Taft Coach Jim Woodard said. “He’d had some difficulty.”

Because of a recent City rules revision, Williams will not be granted athletic eligibility at his new school because the opportunity transfer took place for disciplinary reasons.

In some cases, students with opportunity transfers are sent back to their original schools when their behavior improves, but Woodard doesn’t expect that to happen.

“I assume it’s permanent,” Woodard said. “It’s tough. We’d built the whole team around him.”

College football

One day after they thought their football season was officially over, the Antelope Valley College Marauders received a reprieve.

Antelope Valley was invited Monday to face Orange Coast in the Orange County Bowl scheduled for Dec. 4 at 7 p.m. at LeBard Stadium in Costa Mesa.

When the junior college bowl pairings were announced Sunday, Orange Coast (7-3) had been pitted against Mt. San Antonio (8-2). But the Mounties later switched to the Southern California Bowl to play Citrus (8-2). When the bowls were announced Sunday, Citrus still needed an opponent.

Antelope Valley (6-4), which finished third in the Foothill Conference with a 5-2 record, had not been selected Sunday for a bowl. Orange Coast was second in the Central Division of the Mission Conference with a 4-1 record.

College volleyball

Unbeaten Antelope Valley is seeded No. 8, Ventura is No. 12 and Pierce is No. 15 in the women’s volleyball Southern California regionals that start today. All matches are at 7 p.m.

The Marauders (18-0), the Foothill Conference champions, will play host to ninth-seeded San Diego Mesa (12-5), the runner-up in the Pacific Coast Conference.

Ventura and Pierce, however, will be on the road. The Pirates (13-7), which finished third in the Western State Conference, will travel to No. 5 Pasadena (13-4), the third-place team in the South Coast League. Pierce (13-9) will play at No. 2 Cerritos (20-2), the South Coast winner. Cerritos is the defending state champion.

The second round is scheduled for Nov. 30. The four survivors of that round will advance to the eight-team state championships Dec. 3-5 at Southwestern College in Chula Vista.

High school tennis

Harvard-Westlake High’s girls’ tennis team has grown accustomed to winning close matches over the past two seasons. The top-seeded and defending champion Wolverines played to a 9-9 tie against Los Alamitos last year and won the Southern Section Division III championship on a tiebreaker.

Harvard-Westlake (15-3) was trailing badly midway through its semifinal match against El Dorado last week but came back for an improbable 12-6 victory. So what is senior co-captain Gloria Abramson predicting for today’s Division III title match against St. Lucy’s at the Claremont Tennis Club?

“I’m predicting we’re going to clean them up,” she said. In their quest for back-to-back championships, the Wolverines aren’t short on confidence. Abramson, who plays No. 2 doubles, has a 55-5 record and is one of four Harvard-Westlake players with 50 or more victories. No. 1 singles player Romy Mehlman is 54-8.

“I think it will be easier to win this year because we know what it’s like to win and we’ve worked very hard to get back,” said co-captain Karyn Koven. And when Koven and her teammates were down in five of seven matches against El Dorado last week, they captured the next 13 sets to win.

“A comeback like that is unheard of,” Harvard-Westlake Coach Richard Kinuya said. “All the girls just took matters into their own hands at the same time. “