Randall is a gem of a volunteer at DPLL

Ralph Randall’s second home is at the Dos Pueblos Little League fields.

Season after season, Randall spends hours helping youngsters learn about pitching. He taught his son, Scott, who went to become a major league pitcher with the Cincinnati Reds.

With the Little League season approaching, it seemed fitting the Santa Barbara Athletic Round Table honored Ralph Randall as the Sportsperson of the Month at Monday’s press luncheon at Harry’s Plaza Cafe.

The award is sponsored by the law office of Maho & Prentice.

“This is somebody our league really wanted to nominate and acknowledge,” said SBART board member and DPLL executive vice president Dr. Dan Brennan.

Members of the DPLL board of directors and former players of Randall’s were in attendance to see him honored.

“He’s out at the little league fields whether we’re in season, all-star season, postseason. He’s out there any day anybody wants to work on pitching,” Brennan continued. “During the season, it’s about eight days a week that he’s there working with the kids.”

In presenting Randall with the award, Brennan said, “I appreciate you; we all appreciate you. We like to acknowledge all the volunteer work you do.”

Dave Pintard expressed his grief over the passing of two members of the Santa Barbara Foresters family: Gary Woods, an assistant coach with the local baseball organization, and Doug Reeves, a longtime board member, died last week.

Reeves joined the organization when Bill Pintard, Dave’s brother, took over as the team’s manager 20 years ago.

Woods, a standout player at San Marcos High and SBCC, played nine years in the major leagues. He joined the Foresters as an assistant coach in 2008.

“That’s when we started our run on national championships,” Dave Pintard said. The Foresters have won a total of five National Baseball Congress World Series titles, four coming in the last seven years and three in the last four years.

“It’s no coincidence, it’s a fact that Woody brought something very, very unique to the Foresters organization,” said Pintard, referring to Woods’ work as a hitting coach. “Woody got kids to believe, he got those kids to relax. He was probably the greatest at knowing when to leave a kid alone; he didn’t have his ego wrapped around it.”

Dave Pintard said Woods was his brother Bill’s best friend. “He’s a tremendous loss to our Forester family and our personal family.”

A memorial service has been set for Saturday from 1 and 2 p.m. at the SBCC baseball diamond at Pershing Park. A reception will follow at the Carriage Museum.

PREP BASEBALL

Santa Barbara High: Longtime Dons assistant coach George Rempe received a couple of pleasant surprises before the start of the season. First, the school named its batting cages after him. Rempe has been the Dons’ hitting coach for several seasons.

The second surprise came before Santa Barbara’s scrimmage at Santa Ynez last Saturday. Coach Warren Dickey, who led the Pirates to a CIF title last year, presented Rempe with a bat signed by all his players.

Rempe was blown away by Dickey’s gesture. “Talk about class acts. ‘You just won CIF and you’re thinking about somebody else?’” he said.

Rempe has high hopes for Santa Barbara this season. “We’re going to be in the hunt this year for our 11th Channel League title in 17 years,” he said

He brought three reasons why the Dons expect to be serious contenders: seniors Dalton Schroeder, Trevor Moropoulos and Bryce Morison. Schroeder is a speedy center field who has committed to Brown University; Moropoulos is a solid first baseman and pitcher and Morison is a standout shortstop.

COLLEGE VOLLEYBALL

UCSB: Assistant coach Cullen Irons said the Gauchos are riding a four-match win streak. Among the wins was a first-ever sweep at UCLA’s Pauley Pavilion in the rally scoring era.

Irons introduced serving specialist Bob Curtis, who in a recent match at Cal State Northridge served five straight points, include two aces, to rally UCSB to a win in the third set. The Gauchos fell in four sets and haven’t lost since.

SBCC: The Vaqueros completed their nonconference schedule with a 5-2 record. Jeremy Berch, a 6-9 middle, leads the team with a .339 hitting percentage, Taylor McCluskey is the kill leader with 69, and setter Keaton Arutian averages. 9.3 assists per set.

The Vaqueros open WSC play at home Wednesday against state runner-up Santa Monica.

COLLEGE WATER POLO

UCSB: Women’s coach Serela Kay reported that starter Jessie Porter was lost for the season with a torn labrum. She did, however, receive a red-shirt year and will come back next season as a junior.

Sophomore Miranda “Randy” Schrader and junior Samantha “Sam” Murphy have stepped up for Kay’s squad. The coach calls Schrader her “first penguin,” the one who steps up, takes chances and leads the way. “She always volunteers and that shows true courage,” said Kay.

The coach said Murphy possesses tremendous speed and wins 99 percent of the sprints.

PREP BASKETBALL

San Marcos: Landon Boucher said the stress of waiting for the result of a coin flip to determine home court for CIF playoff games is maddening. “I keep refreshing my computer and my heart is racing like I’m at the black jack table in Vegas,” he described.

The Royals won the flip to host a Division 3AA quarterfinal game against Pomona Diamond Ranch on Tuesday. “They’re probably the toughest five seed in all the brackets,” he said.

The improved play of Kele Mkpado and Connor Everman are a big reason the Royals have advanced to the quarterfinals.

Santa Barbara High: The Dons play at Sunny Hills in the second round of the CIF 2A playoffs.

Providence: Coach Steve Stokes introduced seniors Matthew Eaton, Rohaam Mirakiani and Bryan Briones and said they were instrumental in the team winning the most games in school history (12) and almost doubling their win output in league play (9 wins).

“We had a great year,” said Stokes.

WRESTLING:

Dos Pueblos: Coach Anthony Califano will be taking three wrestlers to this weekend’s CIF-SS Masters Meet at the Citizen Bank Center in Ontario. They are seniors Cameron Cox, Jeffy Uyesaka and Jonathan Coronado.

Cox won a CIF title, Uyesaka placed fifth and Coronado took fourth place in his weight class at last week’s Central Division individual championships to punch their tickets to the state qualifier. The top nine at Masters earn spots in the State Meet.

Sophomore Ryan Fidel, a Channel League champion, ran into a tough draw at CIF and missed qualifying for Masters. But Califano pointed out, “That doesn’t take away from all the hard work he put in. He’s one of the hardest working kids in the room.”

COLLEGE BASKETBALL

UCSB Men: The Gauchos are in third place in the Big West and play first-place UC Davis and second-place UC Irvine at the Thunderdome this week.

“We have an opportunity to make up some ground,” said assistant coach Brandon Veltri.

The Gauchos play Davis on Thursday and Irvine on Saturday.

“It gives us a great opportunity to play playoff-atmosphere basketball this late in the season right before the conference tournament,” said Veltri.

Westmont women: Coach Kirsten Moore said the Warriors are playing their best basketball going into the final two regular season games against Hope International and Biola at home.

“This is a huge week for us. We have a chance to finish second in conference, and we’re the only team to beat the first-place team,” she said.

Westmont men: Phoenix native Hayden Anderson provided the Warriors with a huge lift, helping them hand Arizona Christian its first loss at home last week.

“He’s been phenomenal,” coach John Moore said of the player who last year averaged two minutes of playing time and .5 points. “He’s a changed person this year as a player and a person. We would have not beaten the No. 11 team in the nation, who was 13-0 at home, if it wasn’t for Hayden Anderson.”

The Warriors then got a 30-point performance from Cory Blau in a win at San Diego Christian.

Westmont’s two wins set up a showdown for first place against Hope International on Tuesday at Murchison Gym.

COLLEGE SWIMMING

UCSB: At the MPSF Championships, the UCSB women gained a measure of revenge against Pacific. After losing to the Tigers in a dual meet, the Gauchos finished 150 points ahead of them at the finals and took third place.

Lauren Vosseler played a big part in the turnaround. “She is an outstanding sprint freestyler,” said coach Gregg Wilson. “We relied heavily on Lauren to have fantastic sprint events.”

On the men’s side, “We are the best swimming team in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation,” said Wilson. “But the championship is based on swimming and diving, so BYU scored about 25 percent of their points in diving and that was 210 points. We were able to eclipse about 150 of those points just with our swimmers. We fell short. It was a great effort. We ran out of events.”

Billy Mullis was named MPSF Freshman of the Year. The walk-on freshman is very close to school records, Wilson said. “He’s one of the most exciting freshman we’ve had in a long, long time. He comes out of the vein of Wade Allen.”

The Gauchos are waiting to here about NCAA qualifying. There are 25 consideration times, 19 for the men and six for the women.

SBCC: Coach Chuckie Roth said the team should be better than last year. The Vaqueros finished third in the WSC in their inaugural season.

GIRLS WATER POLO

San Marcos: Coach Chuckie Roth called the 5-4 CIF Division 1 quarterfinal loss at Newport Harbor “the best game I’ve probably ever been a part of. I’ve never seen my team play tougher, I’ve never been prouder as a coach in my entire life.”

Roth said it was a physical game. “One of my players was probably playing with a concussion and another had a black eye “Rocky Balboa style.”

The Royals had a tying goal nullified by an offensive foul with 30 seconds left.

Roth also talked about the Royals girls swim team and introduced senior Megan Bergthold, who also is a key player on the water polo team, and freshman Maija Ninness.

GIRLS BASKETBALL

Santa Barbara High: After winning its first CIF-SS title and reaching the CIF State final last season, Coach Andrew Butcher said so many people have been asking him, “Are you going to go all the way this year?”

His response: “We’re going to go all the way to Chino and we’re going to come all the way back. And, with any luck, we’ll go all the way to practice the next day. That’s it.”

The Dons play a second-round Division 2AA playoff game at Chino on Wednesday.

Butcher introduced Jackie Tran, who was brought up from the JV team to be the back-up point guard. He also brought Lil Ponce and Alana Jimenez, who are both sidelined with ACL injuries. He said the injuries are like kids being grounded for Halloween.

Bishop Diego: The Cardinals play a Division 5A quarterfinal game against Pacifica Christian at Crossroads High in Santa Monica on Wednesday.

Coach Jeff Burich said the post play of Sienna Gonzalez has improved greatly this season.

Morgan Wallace has logged a lot of minutes and taken her offense to a higher level in the two playoff wins, said Burich.

BOYS SOCCER

Carpinteria: Center back Eric Contreras and goalkeeper Jose Angeles lead a Warriors defense that posted eight shutouts in Tri-Valley League play and won their CIF playoff opener 4-0 on Friday. The Warriors play a second-round playoff game at Chaparral in Menifee on Wednesday.

GIRLS SOCCER

Carpinteria: The Warriors won their CIF opener 2-0 over Garden Grove Santiago and will play at home again on Tuesday against Moreno Valley.

Assistant coach Lucy Carleton introduced Marissa Souza, who has bounced back from an ACL injury last season, and Sofia Vargas, who possess a great long throw-in.