Shadowlands

Looking back, 5 years ago this week.

The Newport Harbor High girls track and field team claims five

individual titles with four athletes at the Sea View League

Championships, and finish second behind Woodbridge. Senior thrower Sylvia

Madueno wins the discus and the shot put with personal records of 130-0

and 36-10, respectively. Senior M.E. Clayton wins the long jump (17-5

3/4), while sophomore Alicia McFall (11:08) beats out Woodbridge’s Mary

Moore in the 3,200 meters. April Ross wins the high jump with a leap of

5-0. Corona del Mar freshman Liz Morse wins the 800.

Yugoslavia defeats Team USA, 9-8, in front of 2,000 fans at Corona del

Mar High in the Newport International Water Polo Tournament.

Down two games, the Corona del Mar boys volleyball team rallies with a

flurry to trounce visiting Newport Harbor, 9-15, 13-15, 15-13, 15-10,

15-9. The win improves the Sea Kings’ record to 10-3, 7-3 in league. CdM

is ranked sixth in Orange County and fifth in CIF Southern Section

Division III. The Tars rallied to victory in an earlier match between the

two schools, but couldn’t pull out a win and fell to 9-6, 6-3. Senior

standouts Blair Hoppe (31 kills, three ace serves), Brady Beauchamp, whom

Coach Steve Conti praised for his setting, Tim Andrews (nine kills) and

Mark Burns (four kills) help the Sea Kings to victory. But the key to the

match according to Conti is Billy Messenger’s block to tie the third

game, 13-13. Hoppe, who shaved No. 12 into his chest hair, pounds his

sixth, seventh and eighth kills in the final three games. Newport

Harbor’s lone senior, Dana Messenbrink, paces the Tars with 28 kills and

has help from sophomore Matt Jameson (21 kills, three aces), sophomore

outside hitter Alan Limon (nine kills, four blocks) and sophomore middle

blocker Adam Hearlson (14 kills, four blocks).

Looking back, 10 years ago this week:

After losing in the Sea View League singles finals the previous year,

UCLA-bound and nationally ranked tennis player David Bain from Corona del

Mar High, came from behind to defeat longtime friend John Bowerbank of

University, 6-7, 6-1, 6-4 at the Balboa Bay Club Racquet Club.

Bowerbank breaks Bain in the third game for a 2-1 lead, only to begin

a hard-fought set featuring seven breaks, four by Bain. Bain evens

matters at two games apiece in the third set and ends the fourth game by

smashing a backhand down the line. Bain holds in Game 5 and breaks

Bowerbank again for a 4-2 advantage. The two have competed since they

were 7. Bain had lost in the league finals to University’s Joey Frantz

the year before and had lost in the semifinals during both his freshman

and sophomore years to Uni’s Willie Donn.

The Orange Coast College softball team earns a trip to the state

tournament in Sacramento with two shutout wins over Riverside in the

Southern California Regional Tournament at OCC. Pirate pitcher Alisha

Nelson (23-6) tosses both shutouts in 2-0 and 7-0 wins. Nelson never

allows Riverside (20-21) any chance of a comeback, allowing just three

hits in the second game and failing to allow a runner past first base.

Coast jumps out early against Riverside pitcher Gale Copeland. Becky

Toler singles and scores on Shannon Ebert’s double to the

right-center-field gap. Ebert eventually scores on Sam Lutsch’s hit to

make it 2-0 in the first inning. The hits keep coming in the third as

Toler begins the rally with an infield single. After a walk and sacrifice

bunt, Becky Elcock drills a triple to right scoring two, and eventually

scores on Kathy Shortall’s single to left. But Coast’s tournament stay

the next weekend is short-lived as the team falls, 3-1, to Long Beach City in the consolation game of the state tournament.

-- compiled by Bryce Alderton