GITTELSON BITS column

Crespi QB Prince out for season with knee injury

BY GERRY GITTELSON, Columnist

Kevin Prince, a standout quarterback at Crespi High of Encino who has eight Division I college offers (including UCLA), will miss the rest of the football season after an MRI revealed a torn ACL on his knee.

Prince, a senior, was injured Friday in an opening 20-6 victory over Birmingham of Lake Balboa. He's scheduled to undergo surgery in three weeks.

"This is going to be a hard test for us - we'll see how we handle adversity," tight end Joseph Fauria said. "We can't just react to this. We've got to answer to it, and the next couple of weeks will prove it. We'll see how we do."

Sophomore Bryan Bennett is Prince's replacement. Crespi plays at Kennedy of Granada Hills on Friday.

"This is football, and it will be a great life lesson for our kids," Crespi coach Jeremiah Ross said. "This is a huge loss, but we talked about it, and decided we can just pack it in and call the season over, or they can fight and get after this thing. They're going to get it done."

-- Westlake took advantage of its early football opener in Hawaii last Friday, spending five preceding nights in a fancy beachfront hotel in Waikiki - 135 varsity and JV players, 22 coaches and two trainers.

"It doesn't get any better than this trip. The kids will remember it forever," Warriors head coach Jim Benkert said. "At one point. we were practicing right under Diamond Head, and if I looked one way there was a big rainbow, and if I looked the other way there was Waikiki Beach. No, it doesn't get any better."

The players and coaches took a tour of Pearl Harbor, snorkled, surfed, then took care of business Friday by defeating state power Waipahu 21-0.

Westlake has a bye this week, and that should be more than enough time to recover from sunburn.

Meanwhile, the quarterback competition between Nick Owens and Ben Conlin remains hot as a Hawaiian volcano. Owens finished 8 of 13 for 87 yards and a touchdown, and he also scored two touchdowns. Conlin, a junior, completed 7 of 12 passes for 91 yards.

"Their stats, you can't get much closer than that," Benkert said. "They combined for 178 yards passing, and they're both very good and both productive. They're both first-string, and that's the way we're doing it. It's going to be a nightmare for me to decide."

-- Also combining an opening-week victory with some leisure was former Canyon football coach Harry Welch, now at defending Northeast Division champion St. Margaret's of San Juan Capistrano, a 35-6 winner Friday at Mammoth.

The players spent three nights in Mammoth, driving home Saturday morning.

"Everyone bonded and had a great time," Welch said. "For three days they behaved beautifully, and you would just love the parents - so incredible and supportive and involved."

But did anyone in Mammoth remember the night in 1961 when Welch, then a skinny quarterback for visiting Crespi, threw the school's first touchdown pass in playoff history in a victory over Mammoth?

"No, nobody is that old," Welch said.

-- Casey Blum, a top defensive lineman at Moorpark, could join his brother, Kyle, a quarterback at Idaho State. The younger Blum also is being recruited by Colorado State.

-- Former Canyon football standout Louis Montano figures to be a key player for Div. III Cal Lutheran this season. In an opening scrimmage last week, Montano, a senior running back, had runs of 17 and 14 yards and finished with a team-high 37yards in nine carries.

CLU opens at 1 p.m. Saturday at Pacific Lutheran (Wash.).

-- Jonathan Martin of Harvard-Westlake of Studio City, the Daily News' No. 1 offensive lineman, played some defense in a 26-6 victory over Pasadena. The UCLA commit replaced Jakerri Hamlin, a defensive tackle who suffered a hyperextended elbow. Hamlin is expected back in two weeks.

-- Dave Smith is the new girls' basketball coach at Golden Valley, replacing Troy Best. The team's top returning player is senior Meredith Mathis, Golden Valley's all-time leading scorer and rebounder. Mathis also sports a weighted 4.89 grade-point average, having never received a grade lower than an A.

Mathis' brother, Spencer, is playing men's basketball at The Master's College after transferring from Bethany in Santa Cruz. He played at Vasquez High of Acton.

-- Defending City Section Invitational football champion Eagle Rock has won 13 in a row and 23 of 24. The one defeat was to Canoga Park in the first game last season, and the rematch is at 7 p.m. Friday at Canoga Park.

-- San Fernando's football team, expected to make a major impact this season, took its licks Friday in an opening 41-14 loss to Venice. But Oscar Choto, the Tigers' standout defensive lineman, has vowed improvement.

"We're going to shake this game off and move on to the next game -- and we're planning on seeing Venice again the playoffs," Choto said. "This will be our only loss of the season, and I guarantee it."

Gerry Gittelson's column appears in the Daily News twice a week.

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