Locker Talk

Four local high school basketball players were nominated for the
prestigious 2007 McDonald’s All-American High School
Basketball Team. Santa Barbara High School senior center
Trevor Nowitzki, Dos Pueblos senior guard Julyan “Ju Ju” Stone,
Lompoc’s Anthony Burtley, and Santa Ynez Valley Union’s Christine
Martin were named among the 2,500 best high school basketball
players in the country. From that list, the boys’ and girls’
rosters – of 24 players each – for the fabled All-American game
will be chosen.

Santa Barbara Dons boys’ basketball suffered a
brutally close loss in the quarterfinals of the CIF state
tournament last week. On the wrong end of a 60-59 result, the Dons
lost at home to Riverside’s Ramona High School despite leading for
a majority of the game. The Santa Barbara boys’ squad finished the
year with an impressive 25-4 record.

The 2nd annual Amgen Tour of California bike
race rolled through town last week, with a time trial in Solvang on
2/23 and the start of Stage 6 along Cabrillo Boulevard on 2/24. One
hundred forty-four of the world’s best cyclists blazed through
town, closing roads and drawing thousands of spectators – as well
as the ire of several Santa Ynez Valley residents who felt put out
by road restrictions. Santa Rosa native Levi Leipheimer won a
dramatic victory in Solvang, and went on to become the overall
champion of the 650-mile race – which wrapped up on 2/25 in Long
Beach – with a total time of 24 hours, 57 minutes, and 24
seconds.

The storied, if occasionally overlooked, commercial
scuba diving heritage of Santa Barbara got some
long-overdue attention when the 2007 Commercial Diving Hall of Fame
monument was unveiled at the Santa Barbara Maritime Museum on 2/24.
Paying homage to 40 West Coast-based Hall of Famers – including
colorful Santa Barbara legends Bev Morgan, Lad Handelman, and Bob
Kirby – the monument is part of the museum’s newly opened Hardhat
Exhibit, which celebrates the many innovations in helmet and mask
design developed by local divers and tested in the dark depths of
the Santa Barbara Channel.