Sky’s the Limit When Green Is on Track

Skye Green. No, it’s blue.

OK, start again.

Skye Green, a victim of her mother’s imagination, has little to feel blue about these days.

She married her high school sweetheart. She will receive degrees in English and Environmental Engineering in June. And she holds two track records at UC Irvine.

So what’s in a name? OK, unlike her sisters Brooke, Lilly and Willow--all of which can actually be green--Skye was tagged with a misnomer. Still . . .

“People don’t forget me very easily,” said Green, who also has two brothers, Micah and Shane.

“When I was born, my mother was just being creative. When Brooke was born, mom was still being creative. By the time she got to the last two, there was a trend and she had to keep going.”

Track was part of her past, or so Green thought, when she enrolled at UCI. She wasn’t interested in running, nor was anyone chasing after her. She had been a so-so distance runner who dabbled with the hurdles at Pasadena High School.

Green chose Irvine for academics and her boyfriend, Rod Castillo, who also was accepted at Irvine. Both are now on the track team. Castillo, also a hurdler, and Green were married last July.

Yet Green went from an unheralded, unrefined runner as a freshman to finishing 17th in the 400-meter hurdles at the NCAA Championships last year. She also set school records in the 100 hurdles (14.17 seconds) and 400 hurdles (58.99).

“That’s why I don’t cut kids,” UCI Coach Vince O’Boyle said. “If they work hard and stay with it, they will get better.

“Skye had talent and it was never touched in high school. You find kids like that in track. They never really get it in high school and then, all of a sudden, it clicks. The key is her work ethic.”

Few work harder than Green, whose time in the 400 meters has dropped more than 10 seconds since coming to Irvine. It wasn’t an instant metamorphosis. In fact, it was four months before she got up the nerve to go out for the team.

“I was in the dorms and wasn’t doing anything,” Green said. “About Christmastime, I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to start running again.

“I was the slowest one. I was always chasing people. My goal was to try to keep up with everyone else.”

It was Pam Kurtella, then a sprinter for the Anteaters, who had the first inkling of Green’s ability.

“I remember Skye would ride her bicycle in and then ride it out each day,” O’Boyle said. “She had this little basket on the front that carried her books and workout stuff. She looked like Dorothy in the ‘Wizard of Oz.’

“Pam would say, ‘She’s going to be good some day.’ It didn’t take long to see it.”

Green spent the first year trying to keep up. The second, she focused on weight training. Last year, she pushed to improve her speed. It has been a successful three-step program, although still a work in progress.

“I didn’t expect to come out and be really good right away,” Green said. “Each year there was something else to work on. Now, I want to improve my time and make it back to the NCAA meet. I went in 25th and finished 17th. But I went in scared. I know what to expect now.”

Saturday in the Long Beach State Collegiate Classic, she won the 100 hurdles in 14.52, her season-best. She also finished second in the 400 hurdles (1:01.13).

“This didn’t happen overnight,” O’Boyle said “She took her lumps at first. But the key word is patience. She knew she had to train. She knew she had to get in the weight room. She knew she had to do all the little things to make herself better.”

*

Last angry woman: Megan Stafford, Irvine point guard, was a little irate about being left off the Big West Conference all-freshman team. She managed to find an outlet for that frustration.

She scored 30 points in a 65-54 victory over New Mexico State in the Anteaters’ Big West Tournament first-round game.

“It made me really mad,” Stafford said. “I just had to show them and they will see it, I’m sure.”

Of course, some people don’t seem to have that 20-20 vision.

“We made Megan Stafford a great player tonight, she’s a good player,” New Mexico State Coach John Sutherland said after the loss.

*

Irvine trainer David Ramirez finished 8,439th in the Los Angeles Marathon March 2.

His time of 5 hours 4 minutes 9 seconds was well off his career-best of 3:55. Ramirez, though, wasn’t running for a personal best. He was there to run with his father, Lou Ramirez, and kept the same pace.

“That was second one we started and finished together,” Ramirez said. “Running is just one of the many things we have in common. This was his eighth L.A. Marathon and he doesn’t necessarily train for them, he just likes running in them. For me it was a training run for Big Sur [in April].”

*

From the glass is half full department: The Anteater men’s basketball team did not have the worst season in Division I. Lehigh went 1-26.

Nor did Irvine have the most frustrating season. Traditional power Brigham Young matched the Anteaters’ 1-25 record. To correct things, the Cougars hired Fresno City College Coach Steve Cleveland, who played two seasons at Irvine (1974-76).

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Coming Attractions

Here’s a look at key games this week for UC Irvine:

* Track and field hosts Cornell, Cal State Los Angeles, Biola, St. Thomas (Minn.), Iowa (men), San Diego State (women) and Texas Tech (women) Saturday at Cal State Fullerton. Field events begin at 11 a.m.,running events at 12:15 p.m.

* Men’s tennis hosts Princeton at SeaCliff Country Club in Huntington Beach at 1 p.m. Saturday.

* Women’s tennis hosts Arizona State at 2 p.m. Saturday and Ohio State at 9 a.m. Monday.

* Men’s volleyball hosts La Verne Wednesday and Cal State Northridge Saturday. Both matches are at 7 p.m.