Sports Notes

BACK-TO-BACK: The U15 Boys team from Santa Barbara Soccer Club won its second consecutive U.S. Youth Soccer National Championship on Saturday, pulling out a 2-1 victory over Dix Hills Elite of New York in overtime at Overland Park, Kansas. Lucky Puengrod scored the winning goal….Conner Coffin of Santa Barbara successfully defended his Pro Junior championship at the U.S. Open of Surfing in Huntington Beach…Lakey Peterson’s attempt to repeat as Women’s Open champion was derailed by Carissa Moore, the favorite who went on to win the title.

FORESTERS GO FOR THREE: The Santa Barbara Foresters will take the field at the 79th annual National Baseball Congress World Series in Wichita, Kansas, on Friday against the Northwest Honkers from Seattle. The Foresters are two-time defending NBC champions, but this is a rare season in which they did not win their league pennant. They won the North Division of the California Collegiate League but were swept in a best-of-three championship series last weekend by the South’s L.A. Brewers–only the second time in 21 years Santa Barbara did not finish on top.

TASTE OF ’88: Winemaker Bob Lindquist, a lifelong Dodgers fan, took a busload of friends to the L.A. last Sunday to watch the Dodgers take on the Cincinnati Reds. On the way, he poured two of his 1988 vintage Qupe wines (a marsanne and a chardonnay, both glowing in their maturity) “for karma”–1988 being the last year the Dodgers won the World Series. The signature moment of that series was Kirk Gibson’s stunning walk-off home run in Game 1, and Sunday’s game ended similarly, as Yasiel Puig lashed a homer in the bottom of the 11th inning. It was another sign this might be a team of destiny. Prior to Puig’s blow, Dodger batters had created air circulation in the stadium by whiffing 20 times, yet they won the game, 1-0.