Katella’s Lorenzen Signs With Dodgers

Katella pitcher Jonathan Lorenzen has signed with the Dodgers and will report June 19 to their rookie-league team in Great Falls, Mont., said his father, Cliff.

Lorenzen is expected to play for the Great Falls Dodgers at least through Sept. 3, when the regular season ends in the Pioneer League.

Cliff Lorenzen would not disclose the amount of his son’s signing bonus but said the Dodgers “were extremely fair with their bonus for a 14th-round pick. [Jonathan] is really excited. I think it finally hit him this morning that it’s for real. Now that his name is on the dotted line and he has to catch a plane June 19, it’s sunk in.”

Lorenzen was 5-4 with a 2.21 ERA for the Knights this season with 102 strikeouts in 73 innings.

* Richard Crowe has been hired to replace Bob Flint as baseball coach at Irvine High, Athletic Director Erik Terry said Thursday.

Crowe is an assistant coach at Northwood High and before that was an assistant at Irvine. He is a graduate of Ocean View High and played baseball on scholarship at Stanford.

Flint, a veteran of 21 years at Irvine, will remain a U.S. history teacher at Irvine but is taking time off to visit some of the more celebrated places he tells his students about. Flint, 55, said he may return in a couple of seasons as an assistant coach.

* Cal State Fullerton pitcher Jon Smith was named a first-team GTE Academic All-American, as announced by the College Sports Information Directors of America.

Smith, a junior left-hander with a 9-3 record and 3.69 earned-run average, and Arizona State catcher Casey Myers are the only players on the squad with 4.0 grade-point averages. Smith, a business administration major, was a third-team selection last year.

* The fourth “South County Showcase of Players” high school baseball all-star doubleheader will take place Saturday at Windrow Park in Irvine.

The first game, beginning at 3:30 p.m., will match all-star teams from the Sea View League and the South Coast League. The 7:30 game matches the Pacific Coast League against the Century League.

Between games will be a presentation for retiring coaches Tom McCaffrey of El Toro and Flint.

Admission is $3 for adults and children under 12 will be admitted free.

SOCCER

Concordia has signed two more soccer women’s players, Coach Kevin Macare announced.

They are defender Rebecca Bloomfield of Hesperia High and striker Erin Lea, formerly of Orange Lutheran. She was the Lancers’ leading scorer the last two seasons.

SOFTBALL

Joy Barthelmes, a four-year varsity player on the Bakersfield High softball team, signed with Vanguard, Lion Coach Beth Renkoski said.

An outfielder, Barthelmes batted over .300 this season.

VOLLEYBALL

Chris Coles, boys’ and girls’ volleyball coach at Northwood High last season, has resigned so he can return to school, Athletic Director Rick Curtis said.

COLLEGES

UC Irvine finished 10th and Cal State Fullerton 11th among the 12 schools competing for the Big West Conference Commissioner’s Cup, presented to the school with the best overall results in the conference’s 18 sponsored sports during the 1999-2000 season.

Pacific won its second consecutive cup, Commissioner Dennis Farrell said. The Tigers won Big West championships in women’s volleyball and women’s tennis and placed among the top four in women’s soccer, women’s basketball, men’s and women’s swimming, men’s tennis and softball.

Nevada, which won conference titles in women’s swimming and women’s track and field and shared the baseball title with Fullerton, finished second. Idaho was third, Utah State fourth, Boise State fifth, Long Beach State sixth, UC Santa Barbara seventh, New Mexico State eighth, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo ninth and North Texas 12th.

* Former Cal State Fullerton and UC Irvine Athletic Director John Caine will be inducted into the National Assn. of College Directors of Athletics Hall of Fame Monday.

Eighteen former athletic administrators are scheduled to be inducted during the NACDA convention in Orlando, Fla.

Caine was at UC Irvine from 1983 to 1989 and Cal State Fullerton from 1968 to 1972. He was also athletic director at San Jose State (1972-76) and Oregon (1976-81).

TENNIS

The $30,000 Pie-In-The-Sky mixed doubles tennis tournament begins Saturday morning at the Sunny Hills Racquet Club. Scott Davis and Debbie Graham of Newport Beach are the defending champions in the open division, where first place is $3,000. Kathy May Fritz and Peter Smith are seeded second and Jim Pugh and Olska Alexandra are seeded third.

In the senior division, Jim Kellog and Gretchen Magers of San Diego are seeded first and Troy Collins of Sunny Hills Racquet Club and Brandi Freudenberg, a former El Modena and UCLA star now on the women’s tour, are seeded second. The event benefits the Virginia Crosson Cancer Center at St. Jude’s Hospital. The finals will be Sunday.