State Finals Won’t Be Just Another Meet but a Revival : Track and field: CIF reschedules rained-out championships for June 19 after a storm of criticism.

The finals of the 1993 state high school track and field championships, which appeared to have been laid to rest Saturday, were resurrected Thursday when the California Interscholastic Federation announced that the competition has been rescheduled for June 19 at Cerritos College.

Dean Crowley, the associate commissioner of the Southern Section, said the executive councils from the state’s 10 sections voted 9-1 to reschedule the meet, which was canceled by CIF Commissioner Thomas Byrnes on Saturday because he said unsafe conditions existed on the track after an inch of rain fell during the previous 14-hour period.

Although the North Coast Section’s executive committee voted against rescheduling the meet, section Commissioner Paul Gaddini said athletes from that section were encouraged to compete in the state meet if possible.

“I’m happy for the kids,” Crowley said of the decision. “We all agree they deserved a chance.”

The meet will start with the field events at 3 p.m., followed by the running events at 4.

Marion Jones of Thousand Oaks High, the three-time defending state champion in the girls’ 100 and 200 meters, and Cheaza Figueroa of Quartz Hill were ecstatic about the news.

“I’m back to excited again,” Jones said. “I’m starting to feel like I did before they canceled it.”

Jones, who is favored to win unprecedented seventh, eighth and ninth titles in the 100, 200 and long jump, was scheduled to compete in the International Prep Invitational in Elmhurst, Ill., on June 19, but she scrapped those plans when she learned the state meet was back on.

“I don’t think the (International Prep) people are going to be real happy about this,” she said. “But I feel like my priorities should be more with the state championships than with an invitational.”

The state meet will be the final competition of Jones’ high school career.

Figueroa, who has qualified for the finals of the girls’ 100-meter high hurdles, long jump and triple jump, was bubbling with excitement.

“I’m very happy,” she said. “It makes everybody feel a lot better about things. . . . At least it shows that they have some heart.”

Local coaches were not quite as forgiving of the original decision to cancel the meet, but they all expressed relief that it was rescheduled.

“I’m not sure if we can expect as much out of the kids in terms of performance, but I’m glad that it’s going to take place,” Agoura Coach Bill Duley said. “I think it shows what can happen if enough people voice their opinions about something.”

Thousand Oaks girls’ Coach Art Green concurred.

“It would have been a tragedy not to have the state meet this year,” Green said. “This just goes to show you that when something’s not right, it can be fixed. You don’t have to accept something that is wrong.”

Crowley, who admitted that the CIF office received a substantial amount of criticism for its original decision, said each section will inform its athletes who qualified for the finals of the change and that a percentage of the athletes’ and coaches’ travel expenses will be paid from the proceeds of the meet. The state meet has produced an average profit of $20,000 a year in gate receipts since 1988.

Crowley added that if any of the nine finalists in each event are unable to compete in the meet or choose not to, they will not be replaced.

He also said that if it rains again, “We’ll wait it out, up to a point.”

Thursday’s decision ended a bizarre five-day period.

Byrnes decided to cancel the state meet at 1:45 p.m. Saturday after reviewing the recommendation of a five-member track and field advisory committee, which included Crowley.

Coaches and athletes contended that the meet could have been held on Cerritos’ all-weather facility even if the rain continued. They were further enraged because it stopped raining by 2 and the meet was not scheduled to start until 3. The sun came out shortly thereafter and by 4 o’clock, weather conditions were ideal and the track was drying out, according to several coaches who were at Cerritos.

On Monday, Byrnes said he had no second thoughts about his decision, but when he received a two-page proposal to reschedule the state meet from the Central Coast Section on Wednesday, he began to change his tune.

Officials from the state’s 10 sections spent Wednesday communicating with their member schools whose athletes had qualified for the state finals, and Thursday, the vote was taken based on their findings.

“Now that all the politics and nonsense is over with, we can get back to doing what we do best,” Jones said. “And that is compete.”

* NATIONAL MEET PREVIEW C16