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Obviously, since it's vacation time, nobody wants to sit around and read this, so we'll make it brief...
LAGSL is sending two all-star teams up to the Western Nationals in the Portland, Oregon area next week. Tp help defray expenses the 12&U all-stars are holding a raffle with a condo in Kauai, Hawaii as the prize. More details can be obtained here.
AJ Herrera, a Los Al HS sophomore, took first place in the Junior Boys division at the Catalina Ski Race held July 11. Water skiers
ranging from ages 12 to 72 participated in
the 62-statute-mile race from Long Beach to Catalina and back. Herrera, the #1 seed U.S. Junior Boy, is now competing in the 16th
World Water Ski Racing Championships, being held in Belgium, July 18th-
25th 2009.
Some housekeeping items we didn't get around to over the past few months... On May 23, the San Diego Padres honored the 1984 Padre World Series Team which included Los Al's own Greg Harris (LAHS '74). Reader Doug Wolfe says he believes Greg still shares the record for most consecutive innings pitched
in relief in a world series game from that year.
Former Griffin Boys AD Cary Brody passed on this link about a former Griffin -- coincidentally, Cary's son Travis Brody (LAHS, '02) - who got a little ink and playing time for the Budapest Cowboys in the Central European Football league.
Leah Iris, a Los Al senior soccer player who plays for the Irvine Strikers premier U19 team, got a Player to Watch mention on the Top Drawer soccer site.
UCLA assistant soccer coach Eddie Soto -- who was just named the head coach for the US National Beach Soccer Squad -- will be holding a beach soccer camp Aug 10-13 near the Peninsula in Long Beach. Soto was an assistant to Mauricio Ingrassia at Long Beach State, and his son, Fabrizio, will be an incoming freshman at Los Al HS this year.
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 Champions
Quest · 10712
Reagan Street
· Los
Alamitos, CA
90720 |
LAHS SPORTS: Russ May named new athletic director, Aaron Moore new Griffin baseball coach
Outgoing Los Al principal put his final stamp on the Griffin athletic program, naming Griffin basketball coach Russ May as the new Griffin boys athletic director, and choosing Aaron Moore as the new baseball coach, just before his retirement at the end of June.
 At Poly Moore led the Bears to three CIF championship games, and just as many semi-final appearances. Moore was interviewed by OC180 news, a Los Alamitos based online news site.
May will start his tenth year at Los Al, having earned great success as the Griffins basketball coach. In his nine years, he has won eight Sunset League titles, and the school's only two CIF-SS basketball championships. May and former baseball coach Rob Magill were the only two applicants for the job, the others having been talked out of it by their wives (who no doubt feared late hour phone calls from Griffin parents).
Ironically, Moore's selection creates some uncertainty for the boys volleyball team. Many thought Dave Huber, who has been both the girls and boys VB head coach while being a a sub P.E. teacher at Los Al, would have the inside track at the full-time teachers job, that opened up with the retirement of former Boys AD athletic director Cary Brody. But that spot went to Moore. Now Huber, who is currently coaching the girls squad, may be forced to look elsewhere for full-time work before the boys season rolls around in Spring.
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ALUMNI SOFTBALL: Nelson gets two wins, two championships for US National team
 Stacey Nelson has picked up two wins as a member of the U.S. Women's National Softball team.
Nelson (LAHS '05, Rossmoor) made her first appearance for the
Red, White and Blue in a 7-0 win over Venezuela in the Canada Cup at the beginning of this month, pitching an inning of three groundouts, and securing the
2009 National Team its first win of the year. Nelson then got her first win on July 7, in a 5-0 victory over Australia.
She earned her second national team win in a 3-2 win over Canada.
Nelson also saw action in the KFC World Cup of Softball in Oklahoma City which the USA won Monday night, downing Australia 3-1.
Nelson will next see national team action when Team USA plays in the Japan Cup in Sendai City, July 31 - Aug.2,
You know Nelson is on a roll. Even the P-T's Doug Krikorian wrote about her, begrudgingly acknowledging that there is life east of the 605.
The
pitcher was also named to the 2009 USA Softball Japan Cup team that will
compete at the Japan Cup in Sendai, Japan from July 31 to Aug. 2.
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Eddie Soto's Beach Soccer Camp
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ALUMNI SOCCER: Bornstein, USA score big upset, come close in Confederations Cup
 Los Al grad Jonathan Bornstein (LAHS '02) got some more big-time national TV face time as he was part of the group from the US mens National team which accepted an ESPY award for best sports upset on ESPN last Sunday night.
The team picked up the award for their 2-0 win over No. 1 ranked Spain in the semi-finals of the Confederations Cup on June 24. Bornstein was the first sub off the bench in that match, coming in late in the contest. The former Griffin
also got the starting nod in the first couple pool play games for the US in the Confederations Cup. The U.S. started off the 8-team tournament with two disappointing losses, but rallied for a 3-0 win over Egypt to reach the tournament semi-finals against Spain, the top-ranked team in the world which had gone 35 matches without a loss.
The U.S. team almost pulled an equally stunning upset in the championship match against Brazil, taking a 2-0 halftime lead before falling 3-2.
Bornstein was also one of seven players who were added to the US roster for the Gold Cup, which is currently going on.
Another former Griffin Danny Suits was one of five UCLA players who got to scrimmage against Italian champion Inter Milan last Thursday in a practice match at UCLA. Inter was training for their match against English powerhouse Chelsea, which took place on Tuesday night at the Rose Bowl. Suits spent most of the match marking Inter star Zlatan Ibrahimovic. |
YOUTH BASEBALL: Local all-star teams advance to Super Regionals
 A bevy of local youth baseball teams are still alive in the post-season all-star season.
The LAYB Bronco 11 squad won a Section Championship at Irvine to clinch a spot in
the Super Regional tournament (effectively the Southern California
championship), which began last Thursday in Whitter
The St. Hedwig's Bronco A All Star team beat an LAYB's team
last week in the Section Tournament to also qualify for for the Super Regional.
 Also advancing to the Super Regionals were the LAYB Pony Divsion C (13-year old) all-stars. So far, this team has been a finalist and semi-finalist in two travel ball
tournaments in Huntington Beach and won the "Fish Fry" tournament, going 6-0.
Top row left to right: Ryan Pratt, Ryan Kaufman, Nikki Sablock, AJ Zunino, Chad
Benfanti, Michael DiMatteo, Curren Maingot. Bottom row: Christopher Fono, Evan
Giacomini, Jonah Siong, Blake Panarisi, Eric Shea, and Darren McCaughan. Coaches
(not pictured) Manager: Adam Zunino, Doug Shea & Jack Glaser. |
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ALUMNI BASKETBALL: Fields scores 34, injures knee in summer league game
Former Griffin Landry Fields scored 34 points, but had his 43-straight free throw streak ended and raised concern about an injured knee that forced him to sit out the end of a San Francisco Pro-Am summer league basketball game on Monday.
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JR. CREW: Cours scores for work with oars
Recent Griffin grad (and Stanford bound) Alex Cours
got a nice write-up in US
Rowing's nifty e-magazine. Cours, a Rossmoor
native, has won three national championship gold medals
in three different events over the past three years.
She rows for the Long Beach Junior Crew.
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LOS ALAMITOS REC DEPARTMENT
Online Scores & Results
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EDUCATION: 31-year old Grant Litfin named the new principal of Los Al HS 180 News did a thorough interview with new principal Grant Litfin. Litfin was the top choice of the community citizens group and the teachers I spoke with.
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COMMUNITY: 5th Relay for Life takes place on Saturday
LOS ALAMITOS
ROSSMOOR
SEAL BEACH
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That's all for this issue.
See you on the fields (or the courts, the pitch, --or maybe even the television studio :)
Sincerely,
Larry & Nancy Strawther
Big Kahuna & Boss Kahuna, Local Sports
Phone: (562) 431-7001
Fax: (562) 431-7001
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