Changes On and Off Playing Field Would Start New Year Right

Some New Year’s resolutions for high school sports in 1995:

--Separate public and parochial schools in postseason play. Parochial schools enjoy an unfair advantage with no enrollment boundaries, and the advantage is becoming more evident in an era of increased recruiting.

Putting private schools in their own playoff bracket would also lessen their appeal to athletes who attend a school solely for athletic benefits.

--Continue to pursue corporate sponsorship statewide. The CIF will receive more than $1 million in corporate aid this school year, which helps keep membership dues down and allows each section to maintain current staffing.

--Use some of the corporate aid to create an investigative branch of the CIF. Hiring two or three administrators to look into alleged improprieties would be a wise investment. Illegal recruiting is rampant but rarely policed because of lack of staff.

--Give these administrators the power to level stiff punishments. Too many coaches are getting away with too much because they know they will not receive even a slap on the wrist. It also will let parents know it is not OK to shop around their children.

--Continue to devise a plan to restructure the CIF, the nation’s largest high school governing body. The state’s 10 independent sections are so poorly designed that they vary in size from six to 491 schools.

--Design a more uniform CIF, say four or eight regions of similar size. This would allow for more parity in competition and a possible increase in the number of state tournaments. It would also decrease travel distance in the larger sections.

--When CIF Commissioner Thomas Byrnes steps down in August, hire a replacement with an eye for change. California has been stuck in neutral for too long. It should lead the nation in innovation.

--Continue to discipline coaches and athletes who lose control during competition. Fighting or arguing with an official guarantees a one-game suspension. Perhaps the punishment should be increased to two or more games.

--Consider cutting a week out of each regular season. This would save millions of dollars a year in travel and officiating costs and allow athletes a greater opportunity to participate in more than one sport.

--Promote sportsmanship with handshakes between opponents after competition. Athletes need to learn a greater respect for others.

--Give officials the freedom to discipline coaches and athletes who use foul language. Abusive dialogue is so common, it seems to go in one ear and out the other.

--Discourage athletes from holding news conferences to announce which college they will attend. This is the ultimate in arrogance for a teen-ager, even an accomplished one.

--Consider dropping girls’ field hockey and gymnastics as sanctioned sports and adding girls’ golf. Golf is growing in popularity and girls currently have to compete with the boys.

--Increase the dead period in the summer so athletes have more time to enjoy vacations and less to listen to whistle-blowing coaches who do not believe in days off.

--Make sure heavily attended games have proper security so fans are not left to defend themselves when fighting or gunfire breaks out. It’s an unfortunate sign of the times.

--Hope that budget problems in Orange County do not result in the cancellation of some sports.

Prep Notes

The L.A. Unified School District has postponed all City Section sporting events for today because of probable inclement weather, officials said. . . . Six high school boys’ basketball teams will participate in the first Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday Challenge Saturday night at UCLA’s Pauley Pavilion. The Challenge consists of three games, Long Beach Millikan-Rowland at 5:20, Inglewood-Palos Verdes Peninsula at 7 and Compton Dominguez-Westchester at 8:40. . . . Thomas Whiting, who has shared football coaching duties with Jerry Jaso at Long Beach Poly since 1985, is stepping down. Whiting and Jaso compiled an 81-30-3 record.

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Times’ Top 20 Basketball Polls

The Times’ top 20 high school basketball polls, with teams from the City and Southern Sections.

BOYS

School Sect. Div. Rec. LW 1. Mater Dei SS I-A 19-1 1 2. Dominguez SS II-A 14-1 2 3. Inglewood SS II-A 11-3 6 4. Tustin SS II-A 14-1 7 5. Westchester City 4-A 15-3 4 6. Cres. Valley SS II-AA 15-1 8 7. Ayala SS I-AA 15-1 NR 8. Fontana SS I-AA 12-2 5 9. Washington City 4-A 13-2 NR 10. Nogales SS I-A 15-1 17 11. Crenshaw City 4-A 12-3 3 12. Artesia SS III-AA 11-3 13 13. Harvard-Westlake SS III-A 14-1 15 14. Fairfax City 4-A 11-4 19 15. JW North SS II-AA 10-3 9 16. S. Ana Valley SS I-AA 10-6 10 17. Rowland SS I-A 13-2 NR 18. Muir SS II-A 13-4 14 19. LB Poly SS I-AA 9-6 NR 20. Westlake City I-AA 11-1 NR

GIRLS

School Sect. Div. Rec. LW 1. Mater Dei SS I-A 11-0 8 2. Woodbridge SS II-AA 14-1 1 3. Brea-Olinda SS II-A 13-1 2 4. Newbury Park SS III-AA 14-1 4 5. Crenshaw City 4-A 13-0 5 6. Alemany SS II-AA 10-3 3 7. Buena SS I-A 6-2 9 8. JW North SS II-AA 13-0 11 9. Marina SS II-AA 12-2 20 10. Peninsula SS I-AA 9-4 17 11. Gahr SS II-AA 9-5 6 12. Glendora SS I-A 14-2 NR 13. LB Poly SS I-AA 11-3 10 14. Diamond Bar SS I-AA 12-2 7 15. Newport Harbor SS III-AA 11-1 18 16. B. Montgomery SS III-AA 11-3 NR 17. Lynwood SS I-AA 8-4 12 18. Perris SS I-A 12-2 NR 19. Washington City 4-A 7-4 15 20. St. Bernard SS IV-AA 12-4 19