Steve Kaczynski, Millennium Hall of Fame

Richard Dunn

As the only Corona del Mar High head coach of a CIF Southern

Section girls track and field championship team prior to this year, Steve

Kaczynski can relive those memories of 12 years ago like it was

yesterday.

Kaczynski, a teacher at Ensign Jr. High for the past eight years,

oversaw one of the school’s greatest collection of track athletes, a

group that captured the CIF 3-A title and challenged the top teams at the

state meet.

“That was a special time,” Kaczynski said of his eight-year stint as

CdM’s girls track coach and six-year assignment as assistant varsity

football coach under Dave Holland.

Kaczynski was part of the gridiron staff in 1988 and ’89 when the Sea

Kings won CIF Division VI championships, the only back-to-back section

titles in Newport-Mesa School District history.

“That time (in football) went by real fast, but we sure had the hot

hand for awhile,” Kaczynski said. “We couldn’t do anything wrong -- (but)

good players tend to make that happen.”

Kaczynski, however, is best known as a track guru, having rebuilt the

CdM girls team beginning in 1983, and, from 1987 to ‘90, going undefeated

in Sea View League dual meets.

The Sea Kings were 1-6 in dual meets in ‘83, Kaczynski’s first year as

head coach, then moderately improved to 2-5 the following year.

But, during the ensuing fall, the Class of 1988 showed up as freshmen

on Kaczynski’s doorstep and the Sea Kings never played the dormant role

again.

With standout runners Laurie Sawin and d’Layne Kerr starting in the

spring of ‘85, the Sea Kings went 5-2, 6-1, 7-0 and 7-0 in league dual

meets, including the unforgettable CIF crown in ’88 when they were

seniors.

Corona del Mar also went 7-0 in dual meets in 1989 and ‘90, then

Kaczynski exited on top, desiring to spend more time with his family and

ending one of the most impressive girls track runs in district history.

CdM, which captured a CIF Division III team title under Coach Bill

Sumner this year, featured a 1,600-meter relay team that still holds the

Orange County record of 3:48.28.

The relay won the CIF 3-A title the previous year in 1987, then

finished third at the ’88 state meet behind perennial ‘80s state powers

Hawthorne and Locke. CdM’s clocking that year was also the seventh

quickest in the nation.

“The difference between first place and third place at the state

meet,” Kaczynski said, “was about two yards.”

That day at the ’88 state finals at Cerritos College was also the

night of CdM’s prom, which meant their dates were waiting for them in

tuxedos.

“It was fun,” Kaczynski said. “They could’ve sat on the track all

night and talked to (newspaper reporters), but they were in a hurry and

needed to get cleaned up.”

In addition to the record-setting relay on the ’88 CIF title team, the

Sea Kings received individual CIF championship performances from Kerr in

the 200 (24.71) and 400 (57.04), while distance runner Leslie Cashion,

long jumper and triple jumper Sandy Lucas, and hurdlers Jill Young and

Anne Marie Moiso all placed in the top three and scored in their

respective events.

“We won the CIF championship with balance,” said Kaczynski (a.k.a.

Coach K to his former CdM athletes). “I have that team portrait hanging

in my house.”

The ’88 1,600 relay of Young, Moiso, Sawin and Kerr will always remain

one of the county’s all-time baton squads, the core of a classic period

in CdM track and field. That year, the Sea Kings were the first girls

track team in district annals to win a CIF championship.

Sawin, also a CdM volleyball sensation, was one of Kaczynski’s biggest

surprises. “She had come out of Texas and had that drawl,” Kaczynski

said. “She said, ‘Yeah, I run a little track, but I wasn’t very good in

Texas.’ And then she becomes one of the best quarter-milers in the

state.”

After the 1990 campaign, CdM’s fourth straight unbeaten season,

Kaczynski stepped down as coach and took a year off from coaching. He

then landed at Mission Viejo, which was closer to his home in Lake

Forest, and has coached the Diablos’ successful girls track program for

the past eight years.

“It’s a great place to be,” Kaczynski said of Mission Viejo. “There

are a lot of talented young ladies, and it’s a big school and closer to

home.”

Kaczynski, the latest honoree in the Daily Pilot Sports Hall of Fame,

credits Holland, John Blair and former CdM Athletic Director Ron Davis as

instrumental sources in his coaching heyday with the Sea Kings.

Dean West and Karen Attlesey were solid assistant track coaches under

Kaczynski during his reign.

When Kaczynski took over as CdM’s girls track coach, he said it was

simply “a case of getting bodies out and changing the mind-set (of the

athletes).”

Kaczynski and his wife, Suzi, have been married for 15 years and,

fittingly, have three daughters: Emalee, 12, Carlee, 10, and Rylee, 6.

“That’s it,” Kaczynski quipped. “Three weddings are all I can afford.”