Northridge Honors Four Athletes

Baseball player Dan Phillips and pole vaulter Jennifer Capehart were chosen athletes of the month for January by Cal State Northridge.

Phillips, a junior transfer from Pierce College who attended Chatsworth High, batted .400 and drove in seven runs during a three-game series against UC Santa Barbara.

Capehart, a sophomore, shattered her own school record at the Northern Arizona Quadrangular Meet, vaulting 11-5 3/4. The previous mark was 10-6. The record vault was an NCAA provisional qualifying mark and the second-best vault in Big Sky Conference history.

Basketball players Brian Heinle and Edniesha Curry were chosen athletes of the month for December.

Heinle, a sophomore center, averaged 17 points in seven games that month, was most valuable player of the PowerBar Invitational in Hawaii and on the all-tournament team at the Brigham Young Tournament.

Curry, a sophomore guard, averaged 20 points in six games and scored a school-record 40 points against Loyola Marymount and 30 points against USC.

TENNIS

Marissa Irvin of Stanford, a former Harvard-Westlake High standout, defeated Georgia’s Marissa Catlin, 7-6 (7-4), 6-3, to win the women’s singles title of the National Intercollegiate Indoor Championships at Brookhaven Country Club in Dallas.

Irvin, the 1997 Southern Section girls’ individual champion, won 21 of the last 27 points to improve her record to 21-2.

Irvin, seeded No. 4, advanced to the final with a 6-1, 6-7 (2-7), 6-3 upset of top-seeded Zuzana Lesenarova of the University of San Diego.

Lesenarova, top-ranked in Division I, was undefeated. Irvin, a freshman, is ranked sixth.

WOMEN’S GOLF

Jody Anschutz of Minneapolis and Caroline Blaylock of Cedartown, Ga., qualified Monday for the Valley of the Stars Championship, set for Friday through Sunday at Oakmont Country Club in Glendale. Anschutz and Blaylock each shot 71s to earn the final two spots in the tournament field.

ICE SKATING

Andrey Chua, 12, of Sun Valley finished second and Beatrisa Liang of Canoga Park finished third in the U.S. Figure Skating Novice Championships in Salt Lake City.

MOTOR RACING

Cory Kruseman of Ventura won the 30-lap Sprint Car Racing Assn. main event Sunday in Phoenix.

Greg Pursley of Newhall finished second in the Copper World Classic race in the Featherlite Southwest Series’ NASCAR Touring Division at Phoenix International Raceway.