League changes planned

Barry Faulkner

A proposal that would move Newport Harbor High to the Sunset League

was approved by an overwhelming majority of representatives from 68

of 72 schools in the Orange County releaguing area at a

near-seven-hour meeting Friday at Beckman High.

The plan, which will now be submitted to the CIF Southern Section

for approval and is subject to individual school appeals, would also

prompt a move by Costa Mesa and Estancia, as well as create

substantive change for Corona del Mar for a four-year cycle of

athletic competition beginning the fall of 2006.

The final proposal, formulated by 10 league representatives, was

approved, 53-15, after a four-step voting process to pare down eight

original proposals and 22 subsequent counterproposals created an

impasse.

Under the plan, Corona del Mar would remain in an overhauled

Pacific Coast League, while Costa Mesa and Estancia would join a new

unnamed league that would include Calvary Chapel, Laguna Beach and

Godinez, a school set to open the fall of 2006 in Santa Ana.

CdM, which has enjoyed great success in the Pacific Coast League

since becoming a member the fall of 1999, would be joined by league

holdovers University and Beckman. The league is also slated to pick

up former Sea View combatants Irvine and Laguna Hills, as well as San

Juan Hills, a San Juan Capistrano-based school scheduled to open in

September of 2006.

Newport Harbor, which had hoped to remain in the Sea View League,

would align with Esperanza, Los Alamitos, Edison, Fountain Valley and

Marina in the Sunset League.

The move, most agree, would create a stronger level of competition

in virtually all sports for the Sailors, including a shift to

Division I football that Coach Jeff Brinkley was hoping to avoid.

Brinkley said his team would welcome the challenge, wherever it

landed. But, he admitted last week, the prospect of facing perennial

Division I powers Long Beach Poly and Loyola in the CIF playoffs was

daunting.

Vossen said a Newport Harbor appeal was possible, but he would not

take that step without conferring with school officials.

Hours of discussion and voting narrowed the field to two final

proposals, both counterproposals generated by Orange and San

Clemente.

The Orange plan was the basis for the approved proposal. League

reps made only minor adjustments to it in a one-hour closed session

that led to the required two-thirds majority approval.

The San Clemente plan would have put Mission Viejo in a seven-team

Sunset League that included Newport Harbor.

This plan would also have left Costa Mesa and Estancia in a Golden

West League that included JSerra, a parochial school that opened the

fall of 2003 in San Juan Capistrano.

Mesa Principal Fred Navarro and Estancia Principal Tom Antal both

expressed displeasure with the prospect of competing in a league with

a parochial school some believe could become an athletic power.

So, league reps shifted JSerra to an unnamed league with parochial

schools Mater Dei, Santa Margarita, St. John Bosco, Orange Lutheran

and the combined entity of Servite (all boys) and Rosary (all girls).

Laguna Beach, which would have remained in the Pacific Coast in

the Orange counterproposal, was moved into the new unnamed league

with Mesa and Estancia, swapping spots with San Juan Hills. This move

helped mollify concerns expressed by Estancia Athletic Director Tim

Parcel about the prospect of competing in a league with two new

schools. Since both Godinez and San Juan Hills are not projected to

field varsity teams until the 2007-08 school year, the first year of

the cycle would have featured a four-team varsity league.

Estancia and Costa Mesa had hoped to avoid the scheduling

difficulties that affect odd-team leagues, but preferred the eventual

five-team alignment to a six-team configuration that included JSerra.

“It was a good compromise,” said Mesa Assistant Principal Kirk

Bauermeister, who formerly served as the school’s boys athletic

director.

Assistant Principal Lee Gaeta, who along with Boys Athletic

Director Jerry Jelnick represented Corona del Mar, said he was “quite

happy,” with the final proposal.

The San Clemente plan would have placed CdM in the Sea View, along

with Aliso Niguel, Foothill, Huntington Beach, Northwood and

Woodbridge.

Tesoro Principal Dan Burch, who chaired several Orange County

releaguing meetings, said he was pleased with the process.