National Title for Redlands Women

It’s official enough.

Redlands won the first women’s water polo national championship for the Collegiate II division by beating rival Claremont-Mudd-Scripps on Sunday, 10-7.

The NCAA does not award a national championship trophy in women’s water polo because there are not enough schools that offer it as a varsity sport.

But it’s the first national title for a Redlands women’s athletic program and the school will take it--proudly.

The tournament at Claremont-Mudd-Scripps was sanctioned and partly financed by U.S. Water Polo, the national governing body of the sport.

Redlands’ Nikki Fonnesbeck, a junior, was named the tournament’s MVP. The week before, after Redlands had won its second Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference championship, Fonnesbeck had been named the SCIAC MVP.

And there’s more good news for Redlands.

The school has completed plans for a new aquatic center that will cost nearly $2 million and is expected to open in January 1996.

The new center will replace the 68-year-old indoor pool that is part of Currier Gymnasium--often referred to as “the Dungeon” by Redlands’ athletes and opponents--with an outdoor pool that meets NCAA requirements. It will also serve as a recreation center for students. Construction will start in July.

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Jack Smitheran, UC Riverside’s baseball coach, won his 800th game on Aril 27, a 4-2 victory over Cal State San Bernardino. Smitheran has a record of 805-570-3 in 26 years of coaching--the last 22 at UC Riverside.

His top player, senior right fielder Andy Owen, has broken school records for hits, runs batted in, doubles and at-bats, and is on pace to break the record for most games played.

Owen, batting .409 with 45 RBIs, has career marks of 281 hits, 165 RBIs, 59 doubles and 810 at-bats.

College Division Notes

Carlos Juarez, who coached Cal State San Bernardino’s men’s soccer team to national prominence from 1985 to ‘94, has returned to the program after a year’s leave of absence. Juarez left to be the national coaching coordinator for the U.S. Soccer Federation, which prepared technical analyses for the 1994 World Cup. He returns to direct a soccer program that has been reorganized so that the men’s and women’s teams will be directed by one person--a soccer coordinator. Juarez will be that coordinator, as well as coach of the men’s team. The women’s coach has not been hired yet.

The Cal State Los Angeles women’s tennis team advanced to the NCAA national tournament by beating traditional power Cal Poly Pomona in the regional final, 4-2. It is the first time since 1984 that Pomona will not be going to the tournament. Pomona has won two NCAA titles and made the semifinals four times in the last four years.

Freshman Matt Hernandez and junior Josh Parker combined for a perfect game for Cal Lutheran’s baseball team in a 22-0 victory over Caltech on April 21. Hernandez got the victory and Parker relieved him in the seventh inning. It is the second perfect game and fifth no-hitter for Cal Lutheran. . . . Joe Ruggiero of Whittier hit for the cycle on April 21. . . . Azusa Pacific won the Golden State Athletic Conference baseball championship and received an automatic bid to the NAIA Far West Regional tournament May 16-20. Azusa Pacific Coach Tony Barbone was named the GSAC coach of the year.

Westmont of Santa Barbara has created a Hall of Fame to honor its top athletes. Initial inductees: Dwight Anderson, baseball, 1953; Chip Cullison and Kathy LeSage, tennis, ‘85; Steve Gay, soccer, ‘70; Paul Herman, track and field, ‘62; Peg Lovik Nicholas, professor and administrator, 1954-79; Dennis Savage, cross-country and track, ‘70, and George Terzian, basketball, ’58.