Irish eliminate ‘Eaters

The most successful season in the Division I history of the UC Irvine

baseball program came to an end Saturday with a 6-5 loss to host

Notre Dame in the NCAA regional at South Bend, Ind.

UCI erased the 4-0 lead the Fighting Irish forged through three

innings with three in the fourth and one in the fifth.

But Notre Dame scored single runs in the fifth and sixth and held

on to improve to 50-11.

Junior outfielder David Kennedy went 2 for 4 with two RBIs to help

the Anteaters outhit the hosts, 10-7.

Freshman first baseman Tim Stewart was 2 for 3, sophomore catcher

Mark Wagner was 2 for 4 with an RBI and sophomore third baseman Matt

Anderson was 2 for 4 for the Anteaters, who were competing in their

first Division I regional.

UCI, the No. 2 seed in the four-team regional, fell to Arizona,

7-3, in Friday’s first round. The Anteaters finished 34-23-1,

including 10 losses in its last 13 games.

Junior lefty Glenn Swanson allowed five earned runs and six hits

in six innings to absorb the loss and fall to 6-4.

Grant Johnson went five innings to earn the win, his sixth in as

many decisions this spring for top-seeded Notre Dame.

*--*

NCAA regional

Notre Dame 6, UCI 5

Score by Innings

UCI 000 310 100 -- 5 10 2

ND 103 001 00x -- 6 7 3

Swanson, Nicoll (7), Huff (8) and

Wagner; Johnson, Thaman (6), Kapala (7),

Doherty (9) and Sanchez. W -- Johnson,

6-0. L -- Swanson, 6-4. Sv -- Doherty

(12). 2B -- Anderson (UCI). 3B --

Kennedy (UCI). HR -- Cooper (ND), Rizzo

(ND).

*--*

Contest beckons youth

* SPORTSWRITER SUMMER CAMP: An open-entry contest for any budding

youth sportswriter has been launched for the summer by the Daily

Pilot sports staff with three divisions for boys and girls: Third-

and fourth-graders (in September); fifth- and sixth-graders; and

seventh- and eighth-graders.

Participants must simply write a sports story on any subject with

a 1,000-word maximum and submit it to Daily Pilot Sports Editor

Richard Dunn at Richard.Dunn@latimes.com or fax the sports desk at

(949) 650-0170. The mailing address is 330 W. Bay St., Costa Mesa,

92627.

All entries must include name, address, phone number and e-mail

(if possible). Also include your grade in September and school you

attend.

Entries will be accepted throughout the summer of 2004 for the

future sportswriters of the 21st century. Each suitable entry will be

published in the Daily Pilot sports section and judged

unsympathetically by all five members of the sports staff. The last

one standing in each of the three divisions at the end of the summer

will win an opportunity to cover a major event regularly chronicled

by the Daily Pilot while shadowing a staffer.

Only one sports story is allowed per student, but there are no

restrictions on the topic as long as it’s suitable for a family

newspaper.