Don Golfers Take Second; UCSB Names Volleyball Coach
Santa Barbara High Golfers Take Second in State; Rick McLaughlin Named Head Gaucho
The golfers from Fullerton’s Sunny Hills High found the breezy conditions at the Santa Maria Country Club to their liking, and they finished four shots better than Santa Barbara High to win the CIF-CGA State High School Golf Championship on Tuesday, June 3.
Jeff Kang led Sunny Hills by shooting a two-under-par 70, the only round of the day to break par. Santa Barbara’s Andrew Perez tied for third with a 73, a stroke behind runner-up Ryan Corbett of Monte Vista.
As a team, Sunny Hills finished at 379, 19 strokes over par. Santa Barbara, at 383, finished five shots ahead of third-place Clovis West of Fresno. In the CIF Southern California Championships a week ago, the Dons took the title by six strokes over Sunny Hills and Clovis West.
Other Santa Barbara scorecards Tuesday read: Mason Field 76, Shane Lebow 77, John Baur 77, Ray Gerow 80 and Jack Perry 83.
New Gaucho Volleyball Coach
UCSB has hired Rick McLaughlin as head coach of the Gaucho men’s volleyball team. He succeeds Ken Preston, who retired after 30 years in the position. McLaughlin, by contrast, has coached at five different schools in the last eight years, including a stint as an assistant to UCSB women’s coach Kathy Gregory.
“I am elated that Rick McLaughlin is joining our staff,” UCSB athletic director Gary Cunningham said in a press release. “He comes to us with a wealth of experience, and I believe that he is the right person to help Gaucho volleyball continue a long tradition of success.”
McLaughlin was the men’s head coach at Loyola Marymount University for eight years until 2000, when the school dropped the volleyball program. Volleyball Magazine named him the national coach of the year after he guided LMU to wins over UCLA, Penn State, and Long Beach State in his last season.
McLaughlin then went on a journey to Santa Monica College (head men’s coach); Washington (assisting his brother Jim with the women’s program); Pepperdine (assistant to Marv Dunphy when the Waves won the 2005 national championship); UCSB (fall of 2005); and Golden West College (head women’s coach with a two-year record of 36-9).
