The Niner soccer team wants fill those empty seats Saturday night as they try for a record crowd against UC Irvine. Photo by Steven Georges.

Like in life, there are marriages and divorces in sports. The marriages bring in blushing new brides and grooms—Hawaii, San Diego State and, soon enough, Boise State. The divorces, well for the Big West Conference, it is a bittersweet goodbye to The University of The Pacific.

A bucolic campus in a sometimes-struggling inland port city, UOP has generally been kind to the 49ers. Thanks to free web TV, last weekend the LB locals could actually watch their impressive women’s soccer team complete “a perfect weekend” with a 2-0 win over Pacific Sunday afternoon at Knoles Field.

Knoles Field? What is that? Well the UOP video feed sometimes panned the picture wide enough to see historic Amos Alonzo Stagg Memorial Stadium in the background. Mr. Stagg’s monument to the other football will under go the wrecking ball to provide fresh dirt for fancy and new Tiger athletic facilities.

Pacific, which had minor starring roles over the years in sports but more so in movies (ranging from the 1948 classic All the Kings Men, to the tawdry Gods Little Acre to more modern flicks such as Cool Hand Luke and a couple of the Indiana Jones features.) UOP will join the West Coast Conference in most everything but are still trying to figure out a league of their own for softball.

Meanwhile back to that perfect weekend report, strong defense was the difference for the Beach booters which earned their second-straight shutout victory, improved to 11-5-0 overall and 4-2-0 in Big West action and had an enjoyable bus ride home. They beat UC Davis with a suffocating 1-0 win on Friday and, led by the usual suspects providing the punch, on Sunday as well.

With senior Nadia Link drawing more attention than a Hollywood teen idol, the Sunday pitch belonged to Junior Eileen Maes who notched the eventual game-winner in the 31st minute. It was the talented transfer’s second goal of the weekend and team-leading eighth of the season. The helper came from another senior, Kelsey Wilson, who earned her sixth assist on the play. With time ticking off, Link connected for her 31st career goal. That achievement puts her just two away from tying a 26-year old school record. She also had a game-high eight shots—an effort which allowed her to move into third among the 49er all-time leaders with 202 career attempts.

And did we mention defense? That would bring up more fine work between the pipes by redshirt freshman Marrina Meyers (her fifth shutout of the season) but the crowd, on a sunny Sunday after church was only 125 people. Fortunately the BWC office was watching and the junior midfielder Maes was named the Big West Women’s Soccer Offensive Player of the Week, while her teammate goalkeeper Meyers earned Defensive Player of the Week honors.

That brings up an opportunity this weekend when Long Beach State comes back home to close out the regular season against tough-late-in-the-year Big West rival UC Irvine. Game time is Saturday night at 7PM under the lights at George Allen and the special opportunity is an attempt to break the program’s single-match attendance record of 1,204 set in a contest vs. USC on September 28, 2007. With the listed seating capacity for George Allen Field at only 1,000, beach chairs and blankets are more that welcome.

DOT DOT DUST—Not counting chickens or marsupials yet to be caught, it would appear that Mauricio’s gang will finish in the top four and make the BWC tourney which has already been awarded to (bought by?) UC Irvine…the number one seed likely will be Cal Poly who will play the four seed with two and three (likely LBSU and a TBA) meeting in the other semi final.

Yankee pitcher David Cone: “Yanks looked lifeless offensively losing first two games at home…but in the 1996 World Series NY did the same thing and then won four straight…”

So to mix things up a bit lets talk about the long green on the short green. The long green this past weekend was in the pocket of former 49er Golf captain John Mallinger who had the lead but ended up in fourth (two strokes off the lead) on the PGA tour’s stop in San Martin, CA…the cash was $196,875 but his old LBSU coach Bob Livingston thinks that tour victory number one (and a million dollar check) is coming soon.

Ladies volleyball and basketball now have key injuries to deal with. Specifically hitter Delainey Aigner-Swesey and setter Tara Roenicke in WVB and the setter of the Beach basketball team, point guard Hallie Meneses, are hurtin’. Insiders say Meneses, who was the star for the Beach in the Big West tourney semi-final last spring (16 points on 6-9 shooting) is likely done for the year. Same folks feel that Tara is somewhere in the questionable-doubtful-possible continuum for Saturday’s volleyball but the team’s leading scorer Aigner-Swesey had surgery Wednesday and is out for the duration.

Closing the calendar with this reminder that No. 10 Men’s Water Polo (17-3, 0-0 MPSF) beat No. 11 UC San Diego 11-8 behind the scoring of Milos Vrzic and Nolan McConnell (three goals each)…but LBSU is in tough waters this weekend. They play No. 9 Loyola Marymount Thursday at 7PM in the campus pool and they cinch up their caps and suits when No. 1 USC visits Friday, 7PM. That ought to keep you busy.—DR. DAN