This week’s schedule of league finals for swimming features a few changes because of a shortage of officials.
Don Holbrook, Orange County’s assignor for swimming officials, said the Garden Grove and Orange Coast leagues moved to a Wednesday-Friday schedule to get coverage. The leagues have traditionally followed a Tuesday-Thursday schedule for finals.
Holbrook said officials from other nearby areas are helping in Orange County this week. The county will host varsity prelims and finals in 14 leagues starting today.
The Sunset and Freeway leagues also are hosting diving finals and there is a multi-league diving final at the Marguerite Recreation Center in Mission Viejo on Thursday starting at 9:30 a.m.
Swimming officials can earn $97 for four-level meets and $119 for six-level meets. Officials interested in working next spring can contact Kim Thornton at kimthorntonswim@gmail.com. …
In the Sunset League boys race, Los Alamitos and Fountain Valley tied for second place in dual meets at 3-1-1 and were each awarded 3.5 points for the league title formula. The formula counts the finish in duals and the league finals meet. The totals were reached by adding points for second and third and diving by two. Edison finished first and earned 6.0 points. …
Canyon’s girls finished 3-0 in North Hills League duals and are seeking their first league title since 2010 in the Century. …
Santa Margarita’s Katie McLaughlin, a member of the U.S. national team bound for World Championships this summer, leads the county in the 50-, 100-, 200- and 500-yard freestyles. She will race the 200 free and 100 butterfly this week at the Trinity League meet at JSerra. The Eagles’ Grant Shoults, a county-leader in four boys events, will race the 200 individual medley and backstroke.
– DAN ALBANO
TRACK AND FIELD
Several county athletes and school relay teams produced their best marks of the season last week.
El Toro’s Sierra Castles, Maliyah Medley, Paula Pedrani and Kaiya McCullough ran the 400-meter relay in 47.87 in a dual meet against Dana Hills on Thursday. The time established a new school record and placed the Chargers fourth on the county leaderboard.
Dylan Atencio of Yorba Linda set personal records in the 110 (14.57) and 300 hurdles (39.47) at the North Hills League Prelims.
Santa Margarita freshman Nikki Merritt stood out in the hurdles at the Trinity League Prelims. She took over third on the county leaderboards in the 300 and seventh on the leaderboards in the 100.
Sara Limp of Los Alamitos ran a 24.47 in the 200 at the Sunset League Prelims, which is the best time in the county this year.
JSerra’s Isaiah Diego-Williams (10.92) edged Mater Dei’s Adrian Hernandez (10.94) in the 100 at the Trinity League Prelims. The Lions junior took over the second spot in the county. Also taking part in the qualifying event were Maxx Lewis (Santa Margarita), Lance Dravis (Orange Lutheran) and Stephen Menzia (Mater Dei), all of whom broke into the county’s top 10.
Here is a schedule for some of the league finals this week: Wednesday, Empire (at Tustin High), Freeway (at Fullerton College); Thursday, Sunset (at Huntington Beach High), Orange Coast (at Laguna Beach High); Friday, Crestview (at Tustin High), South Coast (at Trabuco Hills High), Trinity (at Santa Margarita High), Orange (at Century High), Pacific Coast (at University High), Sea View (at San Clemente High).
– ANDREW TURNER, Contributing writer
LACROSSE
The first round of the U.S. Lacrosse Southern Section South Division playoffs are today for boys and girls.
One of the more interesting games on the boys side features South Coast League rivals San Clemente and Tesoro. The Tritons defeated the Titans twice during the regular season, 8-7 on May 1, and 7-4 on April 14. San Clemente is seeded seventh; Tesoro is 10th.
For the girls, Aliso Niguel hosts San Clemente at 5:30 p.m. The Wolverines defeated the Tritons twice during the regular season (10-4 on March 31 and 18-11 on April 24). The Wolverines are the fifth seed; San Clemente is seeded 12th.
The boys and girls playoffs are single-elimination. The second round is Thursday and the semifinals are Saturday at Mission Viejo.
– DAMIAN CALHOUN
BOYS VOLLEYBALL
San Clemente finished second at the Redondo Union Varsity Tournament.
Saddleback Valley Christian (fifth) and Dana Hills (seventh) also finished in the top 10.
Matt August (San Clemente), Noah Dyer (SVC), Brandon Hoppers (San Clemente), Jon Minsberg (SVC) and Grant Marocchi (Dana Hills) earned all-tournament honors.
This is the final week of the regular season. The CIF-SS playoff pairings will be released Friday. If there are any wild-card matches, they would take place Saturday.
The first round is set for May 12. The second round is May 14 and the quartersfinals are May 16. The semifinals will be May 20 and the finals will be held May 23 at Cerritos College.
– DAMIAN CALHOUN
