New Matador Guards Try to Get the Point

After two years of living with overachieving walk-on Lucky Grundy at point guard, Cal State Northridge expected a major improvement at the position from two players who sat out last season.

Jason Crowe, a junior transfer from American University, and Markus Carr, a redshirt freshman from Palmdale High returning from an injury, were poised to make the offense purr.

But despite flashes of brilliance, the transition has not been as smooth as Coach Bobby Braswell would have liked.

Both newcomers make breathtaking assists, but too often make boneheaded turnovers. In 20 games, Carr has 89 assists and 50 turnovers while averaging 23 minutes and Crowe has 72 assists and 46 turnovers averaging 18 minutes.

Neither is a prolific scorer. Crowe averages 4.3 points, is shooting 33.3% and has made only five of 26 three-point attempts. Braswell sat him out the entire second half of last week’s victory over Weber State after Crowe took two wild three-point shots in a span of 30 seconds.

Carr averages only 6.3 points but is judicious in his shot selection, making 43 of 84 from the field.

“Markus is a lot like Marcus Brady, the quarterback of [Northridge’s] football team,” Braswell said. “Both are talented freshmen capable of great plays as well as mistakes caused by inexperience. Sometimes you just have to bite your lip and let them play.”

Braswell is OK with limited scoring from his point guards. After all, their primary job is to distribute the ball. But both make less than 70% of their free throws, an area in which point guards need to excel for a team to protect leads down the stretch.

Two weeks ago, Braswell moved three-point specialist Greg Minor from shooting guard to point guard. Minor doesn’t possess the ball-handling skills of Crowe or Carr, but he has turned over the ball only 11 times.

“I like playing the point, that’s where I was all through [Canyon] high school,” Minor said.

Minor missed last week’s game against Cal State Sacramento because of flu and Carr took advantage, distributing a career-high 13 assists. Carr had six more assists the next night against Weber State and also made a couple of key shots.

Minor had four assists and four turnovers against Weber State and still found time to make two three-point baskets. But he missed four of seven free throws when the Matadors (12-8, 4-4 in Big Sky play) were trying to seal the win.

“We haven’t totally found the answer yet,” Braswell said. “But we have options and we have talented players who know what they need to do to get the job done.”

*

Although their teams are switching divisions next football season in the chameleonic Western State Conference, Moorpark College Coach Jim Bittner and Valley’s Gary Barlow are taking things in stride.

Said Bittner: “It doesn’t make any difference to me what division we are in.”

Said Barlow: “I’m really excited about it.”

With the addition of Citrus, a Foothill Conference defector, the WSC is expanding to 16 teams in 1999. It grew from 12 to 15 in 1998 when Canyons and East L.A. joined, and Compton returned after dropping its program for one season.

There have been several changes in the WSC since 1988, when the addition of Pierce, Valley and four other teams boosted the conference from seven teams to 12. Starting in 1990, realignment became practically an annual event.

“If this conference stays the same two years in a row, it’s amazing,” said Bittner, who guided the Raiders to the Southern Division title last season.

Moorpark is returning to the Northern after four seasons in the Southern and Valley is going for the first time to the Northern, which includes Canyons, Glendale, Pierce, Ventura and Bakersfield.

“This allows for more natural rivalries,” Barlow said. “We haven’t played Glendale in two years. It’s a good game because it’s local and interesting to people.”

Another change in the format is a conference-wide bye week on Oct. 16, the season’s halfway mark, to theoretically help create more equitable conditions.

“I was really bugged the last two years, we had a bye in the first week and that’s a tremendous disadvantage,” said Bittner, who proposed the bye week.

*

The Northridge men’s and women’s track and field teams set a combined seven school indoor records while posting respective 3-0 records in a four-way meet at the Walkup Skydome in Flagstaff, Ariz., on Saturday.

The , with sophomore Clinte Motley setting a school record of 8.19 seconds in the 60-meter high hurdles, defeated host Northern Arizona, 75-68; New Mexico, 84-65, and Southern Utah, 85-64.

The Northridge women, with sophomore Jennifer Capehart setting a school record of 11 feet, 5 3/4 inches in the pole vault, beat defending Big Sky Conference indoor champion Northern Arizona, 86-69; New Mexico, 91-59, and Southern Utah, 94-52.

“It was a great way to open the season,” Coach Don Strametz said.

The other women’s school records went to sophomore Ragean Hill, who timed 7.63 in the 60; sophomore Annetta Wells, 24.20 in the 200; senior Erika Bowling, 55.60 in the 400; junior Nancy James, 2:11.36 in the 800; senior Micki Rogers, 8.60 in the 60 hurdles and the 1,600 meter relay team that ran 3:48.22.

Wells’ school record in the women’s 200 moved her to fourth on the all-time Big Sky indoor list and came in her first meet with the Matadors. Wells placed third in the 100 and 200 meters in the 1997 City Section championships as a University High senior, but she didn’t qualify academically last year.

“For her to come out and set a school record is really something,” Strametz said.

*

Staff writers Fernando Dominguez, Steve Henson and John Ortega contributed to this notebook.