Czech Republic

There will be two former Newport Harbor High volleyball standouts in the London Olympics. April Ross, who starred at Newport Harbor, and Jennifer Kessy have qualified for their first Olympics. They will join Misty May-Treanor, also of Newport Harbor, and Kerri Walsh, the two-time gold medalists, in the Olympic beach volleyball tournament. Ross and Kessy were the No. 3 team at the Beijing Olympics, but the duo clinched the second of two American women's berths after finishing fifth in the Beijing Grand Slam this past weekend.

TODAY Football Community college -- Orange Coast at Fullerton, 5 p.m. Basketball College men -- Westminster College (Utah) at Vanguard University, 7:30 p.m. College women -- Cal State Monterey Bay at Vanguard University, 5 p.m. Community college men -- MiraCosta at Orange Coast, 3 p.m. Water polo High school boys -- CIF Division I Playoffs, quarterfinals: El Toro at Newport Harbor, noon; Foothill at Corona del Mar, noon.

The 2007 version of the Newport Beach Breakers will be similar to last season's team which advanced to the World Team Tennis finals. In the four-round WTT Player Draft held in Miami, the Breakers selected Rick Leach and Ramon Delgado from last season's squad, along with Lauren Albanese and Michaela Pastikova. The four will play with Pete Sampras, the all-time leader in Grand Slam titles, who returns for his second year on the Breakers. Sampras will play only one home match this season, July 10 against the Sacramento Capitals, for the Breakers who won the WTT title in 2004.

Paul Clinton ICN Pharmaceuticals Inc. has embraced an investors-led lawsuit against its former directors, including founder Milan Panic, to recoup $47.8 million in bonuses paid out last year. The company, in a nearly unheard of move, took over the suit, which was filed in the fall of 2002, Chief Executive Robert O'Leary said at the company's annual shareholder meeting on Thursday. O'Leary said the bonuses, which were given to past and present directors, were paid out in compensation for spinning off 20% of Ribapharm, a subsidiary that owns the rights to the company's popular hepatitis drug.

Daphne Sanderson SYDNEY - Bondi Beach, venue for the Beach Volleyball Olympics, saw greatness on the first day of competition here at the 2000 Olympic Games. Many of the teams strutted their stuff during Saturday's elimination games, but Misty May and Holly McPeak blazed through their game, taking the first 13 points before their competition, Martina Hudcova and Tereza Tobiasova of the Czech Republic, could blink. Misty started it with an ace serve, then Holly digs the hit and shoots down the middle.

Noaki Schwartz In the past five years, Vicky Noble has helped countless immigrants from China, Mexico, Vietnam and even the Czech Republic find the key to unlocking life in the U.S. She does this by unraveling the complexities of speaking and understanding English. However, what her students don't know, said Noble, the director of the Mesa Verde Literacy Center, is how reciprocal the relationship is. "You learn about them and about the reasons they came to this country," Noble said.

The U.S. men's water polo team, which boasts five former UC Irvine players, continued its winning ways Tuesday defeating Kazakhstan, 9-6. Former Anteaters Jeff Powers and Dan Klatt each scored a goal for Team USA (2-0). Powers' seven-meter goal with 5:31 remaining in the third quarter gave the U.S. a 6-4 lead after a sea-saw first half that had four ties. It was Powers' second goal of the Olympics. Klatt's man-advantage goal with 5:24 left in the game stretched the American lead to 8-4. It was Klatt's first goal of the Olympics.

Two months removed from Corona del Mar High and less than one month before she starts classes at Stanford University, Anne Yelsey and her doubles partner, Riza Zalameda of Los Angeles, put up quite a fight against the No. 8 seed in the first round of women's doubles Wednesday at the U.S. Open at the U.S. National Tennis Center in New York. Yelsey, playing in her first U.S. Open, and Zalameda lost to Liezel Huber of Russia and Magdalena Maleeva of Bulgaria, 6-4, 6-2, to drop out of the main draw competition.

The road to the 2004 Olympics continues for Jennifer Parilla. Parilla, 22, a Newport Beach resident who competed in the trampoline in the 2000 Olympics, nearly added another medal to her large collection. The 5-foot-1, 116-pound Parilla finished fourth at a Trampoline World Cup competition, which concluded Sept. 7 in Prague, Czech Republic. She just missed on earning a third-place medal by four-tenths of a point, and she was the top finisher for the U.S. national trampoline team.

Former Newport Harbor High stars Misty May-Treanor and April Ross collided in the women's quarterfinals of the $1 million Federation International de Volleyball Beach Volleyball Swatch World Championships on Friday at Foro Italico Sports Complex in Rome, Italy. May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh outlasted Ross and Jennifer Kessy, the defending event champions, 21-18, 18-21, 15-10, in a 46-minute match. May-Treanor had 18 kills, 11 digs and one ace serve, while Ross had 15 kills, eight digs and one ace. May-Treanor and Walsh are two-time Olympic gold medal winners who are now 7-0 against Ross-Kessy in FIVB matches.