National tournaments on the horizon

The Surf City Volleyball Club 16-and-Under boys’ Gold team finished third in the Gold Division at the 2007 Southern California Volleyball Assn. Junior Boys Classic, and next will head to Atlanta for the Junior Olympics.

The four-day classic, a qualifying tournament for the Junior Olympics, was played June 22-25 at the Anaheim Sports Center and included 64 teams from across the nation.

The Surf City team is composed of local players from local high schools including Huntington Beach, Edison, Fountain Valley, Marina and Mater Dei. Coach Barry Sohl’s squad is seeded in the top 10 nationally entering the USA Junior Olympic Boys’ Volleyball Championships Sunday through Wednesday at the Georgia World Congress Center.

Surf City runs an up-tempo offense and two of the team’s strengths are ball control and defense, Sohl said.

“If we’re playing at the top of our game, then we have a chance to medal at the Junior Olympics,” he said.

The 16-and-Under team is composed of Dan Guthorn, Charlie Condron, Aaron Gerardi, Adam Westmoreland, Andrew Murillo, Ryan Sharpe, Mike Megill, Robert McKinley, Dillon Auxier, Jimmy Torromeo, Grant Bell, Chris Trefzger and Matt McCoy.

In youth baseball:

Vikings headed to Cooperstown

Vikings Baseball’s 12-and-Under team won four of five games over a two-day stretch last weekend to claim the runner-up trophy at the Triple Crown Orange County Classic tournament played at the Huntington Beach Sports Complex.

The team, composed of 12-year-olds from Huntington Beach and surrounding areas, allowed just 13 runs and 22 hits in 32 innings before meeting the Charter Oaks All-Stars in the championship game. En route to the division final, the squad defeated Murrieta Red and the West Hills Rebels to advance to the quarterfinals where they defeated their cross-town rival, the Surf City Vikings, 9-1.

The Vikings then took care of the High Desert Hawks, 8-2, in a semifinal game. In the championship final, Charter Oak scored the winning run on a squeeze play in the bottom of the sixth inning.

In August, the Vikings will travel to Cooperstown, N.Y., to face some of the top youth teams in the nation at the Cooperstown All-Star Village.

The Vikings are Philip Knapp, Austin Sojka, Frankie Padulo, Patrick Boyker, Jon D’Alessandro, Hayden Winks, Cody Annella, Adam Gomez, Austin Olivas, Keegan Reeser, Justin Neese and Jon Abernatha and coaches John Sojka, Scott Winks, Kirby Neese and David D’Alessandro.