Words, Not Legs, Carry Sylmar’s Price as He Goes From Pads to Podium

Durell Price, keynote speaker?

Known more for carrying the football at Sylmar High and recently signing to play for UCLA, Price spoke at a pair of banquets last week.

He offered a few words of wisdom at Sylmar’s football awards dinner last Wednesday, but the big test came Sunday.

He looked out at his audience and saw 200 faces looking back. Most of them belonged to 12- or 13-year-olds.

Price was the lead speaker at a banquet for the North Valley Bears, a Pop Warner team.

“I was trembling at first,” said the 6-foot-1, 220-pound Price, who recovered to give the youngsters three key pieces of advice:

Listen to your coach, keep your grades up and don’t complain about your position, even if you don’t like it.

“When I started off, I was a right guard for the East Valley Trojans,” Price said. “I then played wishbone quarterback for the Sun Valley Falcons.”

Price, who starred as a tailback at Sylmar and won back-to-back honors as the City Section 4-A Division player of the year, seemed to hold his audience.

“All eyes were on me when I was talking,” he said. “It gave me confidence that I wasn’t boring them to death. I know how banquets can be when someone’s speaking and they’re boring.”

Price also threw in a plug or two for his high school.

“I was pumping up the Spartan blue,” he said. “I said I’d love to see all you kids breaking records and winning City championships.”

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Mystery box: Allison Rintala had been waiting for two months when the package finally arrived.

Rintala, a member of the Harvard-Westlake High girls’ volleyball team that won State and Southern Section titles last fall, excitedly opened the small box as soon as it arrived c.o.d.

It was supposed to contain a Southern Section championship ring.

It contained nothing.

Somebody ripped off Rintala’s ring.

“I shook the box and looked for it,” she said. “But it wasn’t there.”

It will, however, be there soon.

The Rintala family contacted the ring manufacturer and recounted what had happened.

Another championship ring, valued at $160, is on the way.

Supposedly.

“They’re sending it c.o.d. again,” Rintala said. “They said it would be here in two or three weeks. Hopefully.”

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Fear of flying: Jerome Payton knows that the way to San Jose, for him, is not through the air.

Antelope Valley College (26-6) needs a victory at Santa Monica (29-3) Saturday in the third round of the men’s basketball Southern California Regional to reach the state Final Eight tournament at San Jose State on March 7-9.

But Payton, a sophomore point guard and the team’s leading scorer with an 18.7-point average, won’t have anything to do with airplanes.

“I have a fear of flying,” said Payton, a former Palmdale High standout. “Coach [Newton Chelette] told me he’d get me there any way I wanted. I was thinking of getting a limo so I could kick back and sleep the whole way.”

Or the Marauders might find an alternative.

“They are gonna have to knock me out and carry my luggage [to get me on the plane],” Payton said. “I have seen too many crazy movies about plane crashes and they’ve made me timid about getting on one of those things.”

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What’s in a name?: Just call him the Prince formerly known as Danny.

The senior guard at UC Santa Barbara, who set the junior college state single-season record with 182 three-point baskets in 1993-94 at Antelope Valley College, has changed the spelling of his first name, and now goes by Danee.

“I just wanted something not too flashy but a little different,” said Prince, who averages 8.3 points off the bench for the Gauchos. “I should have put three e’s at the end, for three-point shooting.”

At least he didn’t have to come up with his own hieroglyphic symbol.

Stats

Cal State Northridge softball Coach Janet Sherman reached 50 victories faster than any other coach in school history. The Matadors’ 1-0 victory against San Jose State on Sunday gave Sherman 50 victories in 70 games. Of course, Sherman is only the third softball coach the school has had.

Tawnee Cooper of Simi Valley High finished her Pioneer basketball career with 1,428 points, breaking the school record of 1,391 set by Cheri Graham in 1979-81. Cooper averaged an area-high 26.5 points this season.

Northridge (7-3) is No. 8 in the USA Today/National Softball Coaches Assn. poll.

Things to Do

Third-ranked Northridge will play host to Fresno State in the opener of a three-game Western Athletic Conference baseball series at 2 p.m. today at Matador Field. Northridge (17-1, 3-0 in WAC play) has won 12 in row. Fresno State (6-10, 0-0) is the defending WAC champion.

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Contributing: Mike Bresnahan, Fernando Dominguez, Jeff Fletcher, Steve Henson.