Keever’s Wrestling Team at Moorpark Lacks Usual Cannonry

Any other year, Moorpark College wrestling Coach John Keever would have been looking forward to a match like tonight’s, when the Raiders play host to top-ranked Palomar (1-0-1). But Moorpark (2-3) is off to an uncharacteristically slow start and probably won’t threaten Palomar.

“We don’t have the guns to hang with them this year,” Keever said. “We have a lot of young kids and when you go against a sophomore-dominated team, it’s very difficult.”

It is indeed an adjustment for Keever. The Raiders won their 17 Western State Conference championship in 1994, and were state champions in 1990 and ’91. They are 248-113-4 since Keever took over the program in 1969.

“We’ve had some great years but we are down a little bit this year,” Keever said.

The Raiders will open conference action Wednesday against Bakersfield, which is tabbed by Keever as the WSC co-favorite with Rio Hondo.

Once around: A quick perusal and one can safely assume that Antelope Valley High football Coach Brent Newcomb would finish last in a footrace against his players. But that doesn’t mean the 53-year-old coach with an iron work ethic and growing waistline doesn’t keep trying.

With the start of each practice Newcomb, clipboard firmly under his arm, brings up the rear in a lap around the goal posts before the team stretches.

“We wouldn’t ask them to do anything that we won’t do ourselves,” Newcomb said.

Stretching 101: Javier Ramirez, Northridge’s first man at the Aztec Invitational on Sept. 16 and the Matadors’ No. 2 runner in the UC Riverside Invitational on Sept. 23, missed Stanford because of a sore ligament in his left knee, but is expected back for the Arizona State meet.

“He’s a typical kid who comes out of high school and doesn’t stretch as much as he should and it caught up with him,” Northridge Coach Don Strametz said. “Now he’s stretching like he should.”

Quotebook

“We could easily be 3-0. We’ve got to find that magic thing, whatever it is.”

--Bill Norton, Pierce College football coach, on his team’s 1-2 start.

“It’s been a slow news day in L.A.”

--Cal State Northridge Athletic Director Paul Bubb, sarcastically responding to an apology by Big Sky Commissioner Doug Fullerton for the hastiness of the announcement to add Northridge to the conference. The announcement was made the same day the verdicts were announced in the O.J. Simpson trial.

Honors

Valley College (4-0) remains No. 3 in the nation in the USA Today junior college poll but has dropped to No. 2 in California, behind El Camino (3-0).

The Monarchs received 238 points in the state poll to El Camino’s 246.

Moorpark (3-1) dropped from ninth to 20th in the state poll after losing to Santa Barbara last week.

Glendale College quarterback Aryan Hart was selected one of several state offensive players of the week.

Hart completed 23 of 39 passes for 285 yards and two touchdowns in a 48-35 loss to Valley last week.

Things to Do

Cal State Northridge (1-17) will try to snap its 14-match losing streak tonight when it plays host to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo in a women’s volleyball match at 7.

The Hoover High boys’ cross-country team, led by junior David Lopez, and the Canyon girls, paced by junior Julie Harris, head the list of entries in Saturday’s Kenny Staub Invitational at Crescenta Valley Park. Hoover is the top-ranked boys’ team in Southern Section Division I, and Canyon is second behind Thousand Oaks in the girls’ rankings. The meet starts at 8 a.m.

Contributing: Fernando Dominguez, Jeff Fletcher, Paige A. Leech, John Ortega.