Girls to Get Their Kicks in Glendale

The Glendale Unified School district has approved funding for a second varsity soccer team at each of its three high schools: Glendale, Hoover and Crescenta Valley.

Girls’ soccer will be added as a varsity sport at Glendale and Hoover, which already have boys’ teams.

At Crescenta Valley, which has both boys’ and girls’ soccer, only the girls’ team has received school district funds because it was founded in 1990, before the boys’ team.

The Crescenta Valley boys’ team, founded in 1993, and its booster club have had to raise funds “in the neighborhood of $10,000” each season, said boys’ athletic director Bob Canfield.

First-year boys’ coach Bill Papagno said the boys’ team will still have to raise at least $5,000 this year because unlike the girls’ team, it does not receive additional money from the high school.

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New chief: Concepcion Contreras has been hired as the boys’ soccer coach at Alemany.

Contreras, 40, was an Indian assistant last season. He replaces Lowell Thomas, who coached Alemany for four seasons.

Contreras came to Alemany last year as a Spanish teacher after 10 years at Pius X High, where he founded the boys’ soccer program in 1987.

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Film stars: When Hart High football players can’t correct their mistakes in practice, nary a day goes by before they get the picture.

Why? Because the Indians videotape every practice and review the film the following day.

“It’s very helpful,” Hart offensive coordinator Dean Herrington said. “We’ve gone from thinking we’ve had a good practice to realizing the next day that we stunk.”

The filming is usually done by injured players. Hart had actually suspended its daily taping the past two weeks. But after back-to-back losses, Herrington again brought out the camcorders.

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Finding a home: Dimitri Lagos, who was fired as the boys’ cross-country and track coach at Alemany in June, is now a volunteer assistant cross-country coach at Kennedy under Warren Farlow.

Lagos, a 1987 graduate of Kennedy, said that Alemany athletic director Dudley Rooney told him that he was fired because “some other coaches threatened to quit if I wasn’t let go.”

Lagos said he had differences with Alemany girls’ basketball Coach Melissa Hearlihy and football Coach Pat Degnan, but he didn’t consider them job-threatening.

Rooney would not go into details about the firing of Lagos or Vicky Waggenbach, the girls’ cross-country, track and soccer coach, but he said last month that it had “more to do with relationships outside of coaching than it did with their performances as coaches.”

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Winning Warriors: Westlake setter Brooke Rundle was named most valuable player of last week’s Santa Barbara San Marcos volleyball tournament, won by Westlake. Warrior outside hitter Heather Hutchison was named to the All-Tournament team.

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Getting with the program: The Westlake football program sold at a home game against Hart two weeks ago was handsomely bound with a full-color cover, and all necessary information was provided within.

However, the program came with a letter of apology from assistant coach Carl Nessel, who puts it together each year.

The letter read, in part: “I sincerely apologize to all Westlake and Hart fans for not having the complete 1996 Warrior Football Program ready for tonight’s game. Due to circumstances within and beyond my control there simply was not enough time to complete the program with the quality you’ve come to expect and deserve.”

Westlake Coach Jim Benkert believes Nessel was a bit harsh on himself.

“Carl and a handful of volunteers put together a program and a media guide that is the pride of the school,” Benkert said.