It was an intimate affair at this week's Northern Santa Barbara County Athletic Round Table luncheon held at Giavanni's Pizza in Orcutt on Monday afternoon.

With all schools out for the Veteran's Day Holiday and the luncheon open to all CIF playoff participants, Santa Maria and St. Joseph were the only two school to show up.

Not present were the two athlete of the week recipients. Allan Hancock College football player Terrell Denson has done an excellent job as the second rusher in the vaunted Bulldog running game.

Denson finished the regular season with almost 600 yards and on Saturday ran the ball for 149 yards and three touchdowns in a 42-33 victory over Los Angeles Southwest.

For leading Hancock to 433 yards rushing in the game, Denson was named the male athlete of the week.

The Santa Ynez girl's volleyball team were the champions of the LPL. On Thursday the Pirates defeated Warren in Downey and Kelsey Soos had 47 assists. In the quarterfinal match win Saturday over Santa Maria Soos repeated her feat with 47 assists once again.

For helping Santa Ynez reach the semi-finals in Division III-AA of the playoffs, Soos was named the female athlete of the week.

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Santa Maria

Cross country coach Maurice Sipes was present to present several of his athletes. The boy's team qualified for the CIF with a third-place finish in the Los Padres League.

And although the team did not fare well in the team competion at Mt. San Antonio last Saturday, Sipes still had plenty to be happy about.

“We did have a faster team then 54 other schools in the CIF competition at Mt. SAC this past Saturday,” Sipes explained. “And two - we had our best team time of the year so we have a lot to build on for next year.”

“We had two freshmen, a sophomore and two juniors as our varsity this year,” he continued.

Sipes introduced his boy's team captain Carlos Aguilar.

“Not only has he been an outstanding team captain,” Sipes said, “but he's been a really good student and extremely reliable - he did not miss a single practice.”

Israel Ruvalcaba is a sophomore competing in his first year.

“He was usually our number two guy,” Sipes said.

“Our number one guy was a freshman,” he continued. “It's rare to have a freshman as your number one runner.”

Junior Sergio Carmona was presented and has proven to be a valuable asset as well.

“If you have a good team captain it leads to a lot of stability in your program,” Sipes said when he introduced the girl's captain, senior Jessica Mujica.

Sipes then introduced Nina Chydenius, a two-time athlete of the week and the LPL girl's champion. Chydenius finished fourth in her heat at the CIF-SS race held at Mt. SAC.

“If someone had told me the first day I met this young lady,” he explained, “that she would run an 18:35 on the Mt. SAC course her first time there, I would have rolled my eyes quite a few times.”

That is what she did in the fourth place finish out of 94 runners. She completed the course three seconds ahead of the runner that Sipes thought was the favorite. And he feels Chydenius will do better in the finals.

“We feel she can dip below 18:10 in the CIF finals if we plan a really smart race,” Sipes concluded.

St. Joseph

Football coach Mike Hartman talked about the overtime victory over Nipomo on Friday that clinched second place in the LPL behind number one ranked Morro Bay.

“It's the second time this season we went into overtime and we were victorious,” Hartman said. “So we are good in overtime. Nipomo scored two Td's in the fourth quarter and a two-point conversion to tie the game.”

“But there wasn't any sense of panic or distress,” he continued. “They just said, ‘Okay we're in overtime again, let's just go into overtime and win it.”

Hartman introduced three senior defensive players who have been vital to the Knights' success.

Ryan McKeller plays middle linebacker and is the team's leading tackler. Twins Dominic and Vincent Brunello are corner backs who were able to minimize the powerful Titan passing game.

Hartman then talked about the Northwest Division that his team will play in for the duration of the playoffs.

“It's kind of the spare parts division, if you will, in CIF football,” Hartman explained.

The division consists of the LPL, the Tri-Valley League, Del Ray, Pioneer and Valley Vista. The division ranges from San Luis Obispo County through Ojai to North Hollywood, Covina, Gardena and Torrance.

“The bottom half of the bracket is a little tougher,” Hartman said.

The bottom of the bracket includes the number two seed and Del Rey champions - Serra, perennial powerhouse Oaks Christian, Pioneer champion Torrance, Harvard-Westlake and St. Joseph's first-round opponent Oak Park.

Hartman spoke of Oak Park's speed, “They run the option well and they play with a lot of emotion.”

The Knights travel to oak park for the first-round game on Friday.

Assistant athletic director John Osborne talked about the girl's cross country team.

“They were fourth in the prelims of CIF and will be going to the final,” he explained.

Of the girl's volleyball team, Osborne said, “We lost a heartbreaker in five games - 16-14 in the fifth.”

He then introduced several players from the girl's tennis team. The Knights finished the year at 16-2 after losing in the second round to Oxnard.

In the first round, St. Joseph defeated Laguna Blanca 14-4, before falling to Oxnard 12-6 in the second round.

“We lost a couple of close sets,” Osborne explained. “In doubles we lost a couple of them in tie-breakers.”

Osborne introduced freshman Frankie Eszes. She had back problems during the season, which forced the singles player to go to doubles for part of the year. Eszes was 13-1 in singles and was 7-2 in doubles with Nadia Gutierrez.

The senior Gutierrez was also present as was her normal doubles partner, junior Victoria Thomas. The pair went 8-4 together.

Kathleen DeGuzman is another senior who played several positions throughout the year.

The number two doubles team of sophomore Sammy White and junior Kayla Zimmer were 23-13 on the year.

November 13, 2007