NOTEBOOK / SEAN WATERS : Area’s Best to Compete at Arcadia Meet

Track standouts Glory Dolphin of Santa Monica High, Robin Snowbeck of University and Jesse Stern of Harvard-Westlake will be the leading competitors from the Westside on Saturday evening at the 25th annual Arcadia Invitational at Arcadia High.

Dolphin, sidelined the past two weeks because of a stress fracture in her right leg, will be competing in the long jump and triple jump. Her best leaps are 18 feet in the long jump and 37 feet 4 inches in the triple jump.

Snowbeck will be competing in the 1,600 meters and Stern in the pole vault.

The St. Bernard girls’ 1,600-meter relay team of Laurie Hansen, Kamara Mayberry, Ticko Avery and Monique Woods will also compete.

“I feel like I have a good chance of winning,� Dolphin said. “This is the most exciting meet of the year. It has the most energy, the most competition.�

Dolphin is being recruited by Cal State Northridge and UC Davis.

Snowbeck, who signed with Wisconsin, qualified for the invitational with a time of 4:48 in the 1,600 meters. Her personal best is a converted mile time of 4:37 in last year’s state meet.

“It’s hard to say how I’ll do because I have a cold,� said Snowbeck, who placed fifth last year at Arcadia. “I’m thinking positively and I hope to improve from last year’s finish.�

In a separate day meet, Beverly Hills will be represented by Mark Weissman in the 300-meter hurdles; Roy Choi in the 110 hurdles; Mel Moultry in the high jump and triple jump; Ben Clopot in the pole vault; Raylein Beral, Reslid Hibler and Richard Hwang in the shotput, and Ziv Gottlieb in the triple jump.

Academic achiever--Senior Neil Wechsler of Santa Monica, who will be competing in the 1,600 meters at Arcadia, was accepted to Harvard and Yale on Thursday. Wechsler has a 4.0 grade-point average and scored an 800 on the math portion of the Scholastic Aptitude Test.

Wechsler said he’s leaning toward Harvard and hopes to compete in track there.

Basketball signings--Trenton Jackson of Santa Monica said he will sign a letter of intent to play basketball at Pepperdine on Wednesday, the first day of the regular signing period.

Jackson, a 6-foot-4 senior guard, averaged 19 points, 10 rebounds and six assists last season. He was selected to The Times’ All-Westside team.

Senior guard Burt Harris of Fairfax announced in November that he would attend USC.

Twins Julie and Amy Uhrman of Brentwood plan to signs letters of intent to attend Washington University in St. Louis.

Basketball players honored--James Gray of Westchester and Burt Harris of Fairfax were selected last week to the 1991-92 all-state team by Cal-Hi Sports Magazine.

All-star teams were also picked by division. Local players selected to an all-division team were Gray to Division I, Shani Kennedy of Culver City to Division III and Austin Croshere of Crossroads to Division IV.

Cal-Hi also selected seasonal honors, and Capistrano Valley’s 57-53 victory over Westchester in the state playoffs was selected the upset game of the year.

Joi Turner of St. Bernard was selected one of the top 15 juniors in the state. Covina South Hills’ 74-73 victory over St. Bernard was voted upset game of the year, although South Hills was the top-seeded team in the Southern Section III-A playoffs.

Hot commodity--Senior forward Doug Christie of Pepperdine raised his value as a potential NBA draft pick with an impressive performance in the National Assn. of Basketball Coaches Collegiate All-Star Game last weekend in Minneapolis.

Competing with many of the best collegiate seniors in the nation, Christie won the slam-dunk contest and the most valuable player award. He had 16 points, five rebounds and three assists Friday as his West team beat the East, 117-93.

Christie was hoping to impress NBA scouts with his style of play, but he didn’t expect to win the MVP award.

“You don’t think about an award like this ahead of time,� Christie said. “It’s something that just happens as the game goes along, but it’s a great cap to a fantastic season. Man, this feels good.�

Christie, who was the two-time West Coast Conference player of the year, averaged 19.5 points, 5.9 rebounds and 4.8 assists last season. He is projected to be a late first-round or high second-round pick. Only 54 players are selected in the draft.

“It was definitely an advantage for me to play my game with players of this caliber,� he said. “I just tried to do what I always do, and anything I did offensively was just a bonus.�

Black and blue division--Although St. Bernard had started 0-3 in Mission League play, the Vikings upset favored Crespi, 6-5, in eight innings Saturday at Valley College.

“We beat each other up in this league,� said St. Bernard Coach Bob Yarnall, whose team is 6-4-1 overall and 1-3 in league play. “It’s way too early to panic.�

The Vikings were shut out in their first two league games. Previously, St. Bernard had been shut out only three times in Yarnall’s seven years as coach.

Going in opposite directions--University swept a home-and-away Coast Conference series from Hamilton last week, winning 5-1 on Tuesday and 8-0 on Thursday.

The Warriors (9-2) have won seven games in a row and the Yankees are winless in nine games.

University pitchers Javier Mejia, Richie Rivera and Randall Harris have been tough to hit.

Part of the reason for the Yankees’ slow start has been a lack of practice time. Coach Dave Uyeshima started late because he coaches the boys’ basketball team, and he also has been serving double duty as varsity and junior varsity baseball coach. Mark Muzuno was recently hired to run the junior varsity program.

Yankee sophomore reliever Carlos Velazco has been impressive. He pitched four innings and had 10 strikeouts in his first game.

Power supply--Junior Linda Klein has nine of the 10 home runs hit by the Beverly Hills softball team.

Klein, a three-year starter, has 16 hits in 28 at-bats for a .571 average. She has 25 runs batted in.

This week’s top track times--Chita Obasi of Hamilton ran 16.4 in the 100 low hurdles and 51.4 in the 330 hurdles Friday in a multi-meet at Hamilton.

Other first-place times were Hamilton, at 52.6 in the girls’ 440 relays; Chris Hunt of Westchester, 15.2 in the 110 hurdles; Brian Karpman of Hamilton, 4:50.7 in the mile, and Steve Bernard of Venice, 2:02.9 in the 880 and a 52.3 in the 440.

In a dual meet last week between University and Manual Arts, Robin Snowbeck of University ran a 2:37 in the Debbie Antscherl of University won the 1,600 meters in 6:55.

Other University winners were Halliegh Andrews, who was first in the high jump with a 4-6 effort, and Shelly Hardemion, who ran a 27.1 in the 200.

Lewis Bogdanovic cleared 10-6 to win the pole vault and Ricardo Vasquez ran 2:14 to win the 800.

In the Westside Classic at Beverly Hills, Obasi finished third, running 50.5 in the 300 hurdles. Obasi placed fourth in the City Section meet last year.

Going Down: Rodney McCray, a former University and West Los Angeles College standout, failed in his attempt to make the New York Mets opening-day roster.

Former UCLA outfielder Robbie Katzaroff was traded from the Montreal Expos to the Mets in exchange for pitcher Doug Simons.

McCray was among the final two players cut from the 25-man roster. He was assigned to the Tidewater (Va.) Tides of triple-A International League. Katzaroff will play for New York’s double-A Binghamton (N.Y.) affiliate.

Moving Up: Pat O’Hara, a former Santa Monica quarterback, has found himself a wanted man in two leagues.

The San Diego Chargers signed O’Hara as a Plan B free agent from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers last week. On Sunday, he started for Ohio of the World League. It was his first start since 1985, his senior season at Santa Monica.

“We thought about drafting him last year,� Charger General Manager Bobby Beathard said. “Anybody who has seen this kid at work think he’s a heck of a prospect. . . . Dallas went after him (on March 30), but we were able to reach an agreement.�

O’Hara completed 26 for 39 for 269 yards in Ohio’s 28-3 loss to Orlando.

Staff writer Steven Herbert contributed to this notebook.