Coach Looks to Trade His Crutches for Clubs

He has spent the last five weeks hobbling around on crutches and grumbling about not being able to play golf, but Fountain Valley Coach Don Terranove also is counting his blessings that walking and playing golf will be part of his future.

About five weeks ago, Terranove was crossing a campus parking lot when his left leg was nearly crushed by an equipment trailer. He had turned his back to the vehicle and slipped on a speed bump.

As the trailer hopped over the same speed bump, one of its tires slid down the back of Terranove’s leg.

The official diagnosis is a crush wound: all the muscle tissue, arteries and nerves in his lower left leg were completely crushed. There were no broken bones.

“I kept waiting to hear the snapping of the leg,” Terranove said. “I didn’t know what was down there because I was afraid to look.”

Terranove, 58, spent eight days in the hospital and doctors told him he will walk again, but there will also be some permanent damage.

“The first thing I asked was ‘Will I be playing golf again?’ ” Terranove said. “And the answer was ‘yes, but the rest of your life you’ll know that you were run over.’ ”

Terranove will be on crutches for about three more months, but remains in good spirits despite missing school since the accident.

“I feel fine,” he said. “That’s what makes it worse.”

SCORING CONTROVERSY

Newport Harbor and Marina are both claiming victory in an 18-hole nonleague match last week because each used different methods to score the match.

The match was split into nine-hole matches on each team’s home course, a common practice.

Jim Warren of Newport Harbor used the top five individual scores from each nine, then added them together and came up with a 404-405 Newport Harbor victory. In this method, the nine-hole scores of two different players can be used for an 18-hole score.

Marina’s Frank Ruotolo waited until all 18 holes were complete before determining the top five scores, and came up with a 405-411 Marina victory. In this method, individual nine-hole scores are combined only if substitutes are declared before the match.

Southern Section Commissioner Jim Staunton is looking into the discrepancy.

“From our understanding, it is a matter of agreement between coaches,” Staunton said. “But obviously there isn’t agreement here and it’s a matter we’re really going to have to address as a golf committee.”

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