Golden Knight-laden Cal Lu wins title

GLENDALE — The following are updates on area athletes at the collegiate level.

Rian Younker (St. Francis High, 2009) sophomore, defensive tackle, Cal Lutheran University football: For only the second time in program history, Cal Lutheran won the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference title outright and it came in the final game played at Cal Lu’s Mt. Clef Stadium.

Ryan Younker led a strong contingent of St. Francis High graduates that played a significant role in the Swordmen’s title-clinching 24-0 win over Occidental College on Saturday.

Younker had four tackles, including a sack of Oxy quarterback Luke Collis, who’s also a St. Francis graduate.

Younker was one of four former Golden Knights to start for Cal Lutheran and one of five who played.

On offense, Nick Sabatella started at left tackle with John Schachtner at center and Darryl Carter at fullback. Carter had just one carry for two yards, but as a team, the Swordsmen rushed 58 times for 309 yards and two touchdowns.

Chris Cabrera also notched a tackle on special teams.

For the season, Younker has notched 31 tackles, 5.5 for a loss with 3.5 sacks in nine games played. Cabrera has seen time in five games and has tallied 12 tackles.

Carter has carried the ball just six times for 13 yards and caught three passes for 47 yards in eight games.

On Saturday, Cal Lutheran (8-1) will play Linfield of Oregon on the road in the first round of the NCAA Division III playoffs. The Swordsmen opened their season with a 47-42 victory over Linfield.

In Saturday’s game, Collis was held to just 97 yards passing, as he completed 17 of 33 passes and threw one interception. For the season, Occidental went 5-4 and 3-3 in SCIAC. On the year, Collis completed 150 passes in 235 attempts at a 64% clip for 1,773 yards and 13 touchdowns to five picks in seven games.

Rosa Del Toro (Glendale Community College, 2010) junior, Long Beach State women’s cross-country: Del Toro continued her stellar rookie season for Long Beach in the NCAA Division I West Regional on Saturday in Oregon.

Del Toro broke the Long Beach school record in the women’s 6,000 meters with a time of 20 minutes 45.51 seconds to finish 26th overall. As the team’s No. 1 finisher, as she’s been most of the season, she led the 49ers to an 11th-place finish. She broke the school record by roughly seven seconds.

Nina Moore, also a former GCC standout, was the No. 5 runner for Long Beach, finishing in 21:56.99 for 103rd place.

Running for Cal State Northridge in the race, GCC product Zitalic Ley was the 150th runner across the finish with a time of 22:29.10.

UC Irvine placed 18th in the race — which was won by Washington and individually by Oregon’s Jordan Hasay in 20:01.90 — with Crescenta Valley graduate Carlotta Pham as the No. 7 finisher in 22:57.02 to take 174th.

Zack Torres (Crescenta Valley High, 2009) sophomore, UCLA men’s cross-country: On Saturday in Oregon at the NCAA West Regional, Torres turned in what was arguably his finest college race.

The former two-time News-Press Male Athlete of the Year was the third Bruin across the finish line, placing 58th in 31:09.81 in the men’s 10K to help UCLA to an eighth-place finish. Oregon won the race with Portland’s Trevor Dunbar winning the race in 29:57.89.

Also in the race, Torres’ former teammate at Crescenta Valley High, Brett Matejka, finished 86th in 31:35.93 as the No. 2 runner for a UC Irvine squad that finished 18th.

Nick Posthuma (St. Francis High, 2007) junior, forward, Cal State Fullerton men’s soccer: Posthuma scored his team-leading ninth goal in the first half of Fullerton’s biggest victory of the season on Wednesday, as the Titans defeated No. 1 seed UC Irvine, 2-1, in the semifinals of the Big West Conference postseason tournament.

On Saturday, though, Fullerton’s season came to a close in the tournament finals with a 3-1 loss to Santa Barbara.

For the season, Posthuma led the team with nine goals and 19 points. He started in 17 of the 19 games he played in. Teammate Nick Swart, who was also a standout at St. Francis, was a starting midfielder for 17 games with Fullerton and played in 21.

Fullerton’s season ended with a mark of 7-12-2.