UCLA’s Ceniza, McCalla Blend to Perfection

At first glance, the two seem incongruous. One is powerful, almost overwhelming, while the other scampers around the court like a little bird. Only after a quirk united UCLA’s Mamie Ceniza and Iwalani McCalla as a doubles team last year was the genius of the pairing apparent.

Ceniza and McCalla, both seniors, won the 1992 doubles championship at the NCAA women’s tennis tournament at Stanford on May 21, defeating top-seeded Susan Gilchrist and Vickie Paynter of Texas, 6-4, 6-4.

Light-footed Ceniza and hard-hitting McCalla complement each other.

“Iwalani has great returns and a great serve, and when she hits those, that kind of puts me in a position where I can take advantage of it,” Ceniza said.

McCalla agreed. “I set up the point for her, and she uses her quick feet to put it away,” she said.

Although they played doubles together in junior tennis, Ceniza and McCalla had different partners in their early UCLA careers.

But last year, Bruin Coach Bill Zaima tinkered with the lineup in late season, making former UCLA All-Americans Stella Sampras, then Ceniza’s partner, and Kimberly Po, who played with McCalla, his top doubles team. That left Ceniza and McCalla to pair up for the No. 2 spot. Sampras and Po lost in the finals of the 1991 NCAA doubles championship, and Ceniza and McCalla lost in the quarterfinals.

But Ceniza and McCalla took over the top doubles spot this year, learned to capitalize on each other’s differences and finished with a 21-3 record.

Now that Ceniza and McCalla are champions, it’s plain to see how their dissimilar styles make one perfect doubles team.

Noelle Porter’s running shoes beat a trail along Pacific Coast Highway as she trained for her final appearance in the NCAA women’s tennis championships this season. She also biked and swam after tennis practice as part of a cross-training regimen.

While her obsession with exercise helped her tennis, it also led to her downfall.

No. 14-ranked Porter has not walked since her world exploded with pain at the national tournament. Porter (16-2), a senior, was practicing before Pepperdine’s first match when a tendon in her foot ruptured, ending her college career moments before she was about to play in her most important tournament.

Although Porter’s foot bothered her since fall, she played No. 1 singles and continued to cross-train all season, retiring in only one match because of her injury.

“I wasn’t, perhaps, following my doctor’s orders by biking and swimming. Maybe it was my fault because I over-did it,” Porter said.

No. 12 Pepperdine (15-6) took only six players to the tournament because of injuries, and after Porter’s, they defaulted their first match at No. 6 singles, and lost, 5-2, to No. 6 California (18-7).

“I felt awful because this whole situation was out of my hands,” Porter said.

While Porter hopes to walk again soon and to begin exercising in the next few months, she won’t think about plans to resume tennis, yet.

“I’ve had a lot of time to think about things in the last couple weeks,” Porter said. “I’m just looking at life in general, being able to walk and do normal things.”

Todd Andrews shot a 210 over 54 holes in the NCAA West Region men’s golf championships May 21-23 at Tucson National golf course to place in a four-way tie for sixth overall. With his finish, he earned one of the West Region’s two individual at-large berths for the NCAA Division I men’s golf championships June 3-6 at Albuquerque, N.M.

The field at the West Regional included the nation’s top collegiate golfers. One of the players with whom Andrews tied was Arizona’s Manny Zerman, one of only two collegiate players to compete at The Master’s in April.

Unlike his competition, Andrews, a sophomore, walked on to the Pepperdine team last season after playing at Torrey Pines High in San Diego.

The inconsistent Andrews shot a round of 81 in the fall, but also set a new West Coast Conference record with a six-under-par 66 on the final day of the WCC Championships on April 28 to finish second.

Jill McGill of USC shot an even-par 72 in the final round to finish in a four-way tie for ninth place (294) at the NCAA women’s golf championships at Karsten Golf Course in Tempe, Ariz., on Saturday.

McGill was the highest finisher for USC, which tied for 15th place with a score of 1,239 in the 17-team field.

UCLA took fifth place with a 1,193 and was led by Christy Erb, who shot a 295 to finish in a four-way tie for 13th place overall.

San Jose State scored a 1,171 to win the tournament. Vicki Goetze, a freshman from Georgia, fired an NCAA championship and course record 65 on the final day to finish as the top individual (280).

Notes

On April 26, Cal State Fullerton Coach Judy Garman became the first NCAA Division I women’s softball coach to win 650 games. UCLA’s Sharron Backus won her 650th game on May 9. Because Fullerton was eliminated in regional play on May 17 in the NCAA Division I women’s softball tournament and UCLA went on to win the national championship on May 25, the two coaches are tied in victories. Backus is 657-129-3 in 17 years and Garman is 657-195-4 in 13 years. Backus graduated from Fullerton. . . . Washington edged the UCLA men’s crew by three-tenths of a second to win the men’s varsity eight final in the Pacific Coast Rowing Championships in Sacramento on May 24. The Bruins’ second-place finish qualifies them for the Heschede Cup in Cincinnati on June 13. The national champion will be named from the event, which will include perennial rowing powers Harvard, Princeton, Pennsylvania, Cornell, Dartmouth and Washington.