The Cupertino Courier

Photograph by Stephen Brashear

Lynbrook's Suzannah Johnson tossed in four goals to lead the Vikings to a 13-8 water polo win over Los Gatos last week.

Football teams open league

Johnson goals lead Vikes to polo win

By Dick Sparrer

It's time for area football teams to play for real.

Not that there's been anything artificial about the first three weeks of the high school football season, but local teams will end the preseason this weekend when they open the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League campaign.

Monta Vista opens the De Anza Division season on the road against Los Gatos. The Matadors will visit the Wildcats on Oct. 3, 7:30 p.m.

The Cats are a deceiving 0-3 this season, losing to San Lorenzo Valley, Oak Grove and Leland. The Eagles and Chargers are among the top teams in the Central Coast Section.

The Matadors split their first two games of the season, but suffered a severe loss when outstanding senior Alex Munro was injured and lost for the season.

Homestead will take a 1-2 nonleague record into the De Anza Division opener on Friday. The Mustangs visit Wilcox on Oct. 3, 7:30 p.m. The Chargers clubbed Mountain View 42-6 last week.

The Mustangs slipped to 1-2 with a 19-7 loss to Washington of Fremont.

Lynbrook and Cupertino are both 0-3 as they head into El Camino Division openers this weekend. But both lost tough decisions last week.

The Vikings are 0-3 after falling 47-44 to Fremont in a high-scoring affair last Saturday night. The Vikes will host Mountain View on Oct. 3, 7:30 p.m., at Cupertino.

Cupertino lost a 24-23 heartbreaker to Andrew Hill to slip to 0-3 in the young season. The Pioneers will visit Milpitas on Oct. 4, 7:30 p.m. The Trojans are 1-2 after losing to Overfelt last week.

Vikings whip Cats

Suzannah Johnson poured in four goals, and Joanna Chung added three to lead the Lynbrook girls' water polo team to an impressive 13-8 win over Los Gatos last week.

Samara Silverman and Kim Erouhi tossed in two goals apiece for the winners, and Nicole Morasky and Tine Van Criekinge added one each.

Pioneers third

Cupertino's Nuru Abdella and Celeste Dunlop came through with matching third-place finishes to lead the Pioneers into the top 10 in both the boys' and girls' divisions at the Central Park Invitational in Santa Clara last week.

Abdella covered the 2.3-mile distance in 12:05 to finish third in the boys' race, with teammate J.J. Sclar fourth in 12:10. The two led the Pioneers to a team fifth with 142 points.

Homestead's Matt Hovik romped to an 11th-place finish individually in 12:40 to lead the Mustangs to a team ninth.

In the girls' division, Dunlop romped to a third-place finish overall in 14:27 to help Cupertino a team ninth.

Jennifer Nguyen of Monta Vista finished 10th in 15:19 to lead the Matadors to a fifth-place finish in the team standings. The Mats were 10th in the boys' division.

Fremont and Lynbrook also competed in the invitational meet.

Cupertino splits

Erica Boss and Kathryn Auch put together solid back-to-back efforts, but the Cupertino girls' volleyball team could manage just a split in two matches last week.

Boss had 19 kills, and Auch was good on 19 of 21 serves for 16 points in a 13-15, 15-2, 15-7, 15-11 win over Fremont. Denise Stewart, a 5-foot-10 junior middle blocker, supported with 10 kills.

"In the first game, we were back on our heels the whole time," said coach Marty Redman. "They have kind of a different offense. But after that we got it going pretty good and played our style of game."

The Pioneers slipped to 8-4 for the year when they dropped a 12-15, 15-4, 15-10, 15-11 decision to Milpitas. Boss hit on 24 of 25 serves for 16 points and she added 13 digs, and Auch was 13 for 13 serving.

"Milpitas is definitely a CCS top 20 team, and we gave them a good game," said Redman. "I was pretty proud of the way we played."

It was the serving of Boss that kept Cupertino in the match.

"The Milpitas coach said her serve is as good as he's seen," said Redman, "and Jeff Lamb has been around quite a while."

Margaret Le had 12 digs, and Stewart finished with seven kills.

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