Dolphins

All three of the Mariners Christian School boys' volleyball teams advanced to the championship games of the Christian Athletic League of Orange County Friday at Liberty Christian in Huntington Beach. The Dolphins brought home two out of three championship titles in seventh-grade Division II and eighth-grade Division I. In the eighth-grade Division I championship Calvary Chapel and Mariners continued the excellent rivalry between the two schools with yet another matchup in the final.

The dolphin topiaries that have become Corona del Mar's center-of-town mascots are overgrown and shaggy and need professional help, the Corona del Mar Business Improvement District's board members decided Thursday morning. "Are they anchors? Are they bombs? Are they manatees?" said C. Scott Palmer. "They just don't look like dolphins. I would like the B.I.D. to hire an expert to take them back to a dolphin-ary shape. " The dolphin topiaries, which are placed in the median of East Coast Highway and Marguerite Avenue, were planted in 1993.

Video Photos COSTA MESA — Nobody was going to beat the Andersen Elementary girls’ fifth- and sixth-grade gold division team at the Daily Pilot Cup. After all, you can’t lose if you don’t allow the ball into the net, and the Dolphins shined defensively all tournament long. They capped it off Sunday at the Costa Mesa Farm Complex, winning their second straight gold division title over Kaiser, 4-0. Coach Dave Scott’s club outscored opponents, 19-0, in five tournament games.

In all due respect to Dennis Kelly, the marine mammal expert, I think he needs to lighten up a little ("Dolphins nose about bay," Aug. 12). We know he has studied dolphin behavior for a long time and is very credible. However, we all know that the dolphins are highly-intelligent creatures, and if they didn't want to interact, they would certainly find their way out the way they did in. We know dolphins can locate food from miles and miles away, and certainly if they can catch the schools of fish in the vast ocean from where they came, they can catch that school of fish in the Back Bay, even if the electric boat scared that one school.

COSTA MESA ? As the final whistle blew, Dave Scott stormed onto the field and hugged many of the girls on his team. If he could, he would have scooped them all up at the same time. He said the moment was touching for him. It was elation, celebration and fascination all rolled into one. For the fifth straight year, the Daily Pilot Cup Gold Division championship was wonb by the third- and fourth-grade girls of Andersen Elementary. This one had some special meaning for Scott, the coach whose Silver Division team lost in the title game last year.

Mariners Christian School closed out January in grand fashion earning victories in various sports on different grade levels. The Mariners Christian sixth-grade boys’ basketball team used pressure defense and relentless rebounding to defeat Huntington Christian, 51-23, in a Christian Athletic League of Orange County match-up last week. George MacCable led the Mariners Christian scoring attack with a strong inside presence, putting up 18 points. Taso Marcopulos contributed as well from the outside and handed off numerous assists to MacCable, Stephen Guder and Mitch Dean , who helped dominate the paint.

Bryce Alderton Sometimes all that is needed to reach a goal is passion and love and the rest follows. Rea Elementary third- and fourth-grade boys began approaching Coach Ryan Baker months ago, asking if they could play in the Daily Pilot Cup. "These kids live for soccer," Baker said. The desire paid off, as Rea outlasted two-time defending division champion Mariners Christian, 1-0, in the Gold division final Sunday at the Costa Mesa Farm Sports Complex.

DANA POINT — As Corona del Mar High sophomore tennis player Melissa Matsuoka walked by, teammate Azadeh Nazemi tried to cheer her up. “Melissa, good job,” Nazemi said after the 6-2 loss. “You got some games!” Matsuoka gave Nazemi a quizzical look, but Nazemi wasn’t fooling around. “No, I’m serious!” Nazemi said. Games were hard to get off the Dana Hills girls’ tennis team Wednesday, especially in singles.

Bryce Alderton Newport Harbor High's baseball team can gain solace that it held its own against South Coast League foe Dana Hills Tuesday, even if the effort wasn't enough to win. The Dolphins -- behind the crafty breaking balls of starter Trevor Helms that zig-zagged to find nearly every part of the plate and the run-producing machine at the top of the order -- downed the host Sailors, 9-5, in a quarterfinal matchup...

COSTA MESA - Right before taking a penalty kick Sunday, Andersen Elementary student Julie Bartz heard some words of encouragement from her mother, Cathy. "You can do it!" Cathy Bartz said. "You practice this every day!" Julie put away the penalty kick into the middle of the goal. She had so much fun doing it, she scored twice more after that. Her hat trick helped Andersen defeat Lincoln, 4-0, in the Daily Pilot Cup girls' fifth- and sixth-grade gold division title match Sunday at Jack Hammett Sports Complex.

COSTA MESA - For two 30-minute halves, Kyle Binford does his best to disarm scoring chances. But if penalty kicks are required, as they were twice on Sunday for his Mariners Christian School third- and fourth-grade boys' soccer team, the defender showed he certainly knows how to find the back of the net. Binford converted a pair of game-winning penalty kicks Sunday to help the Dolphins claim the Daily Pilot Cup boys' gold division title at...

NEWPORT BEACH - Coach Steve Astor said there is one boys' volleyball team Newport Harbor High has wanted to play all season. The Sailors earned a shot to face that team. Newport Harbor gets to see Dana Hills after the host Sailors swept Ventura, 27-25, 25-14, 25-16, in the first round of the CIF Southern Section Division 1 playoffs on Tuesday. While Astor said the site of Thursday's second-round matchup between the Sailors (22-8) and Dolphins (29-4) would be decided by a coin flip on Wednesday morning, he doesn't care where the match is played.

They can tap curving putts like big-time players, hit tee shots more than 230 feet and some have already played competitive golf for one or two years. They are seventh and eighth-grade students who play for the Mariners Christian School boys' and girls' golf team. The school located in Costa Mesa is fielding its golf team for its first season. Head coach Brian Jones, in his first year coaching golf at any level, has played for 22 years, never competitively. A fifth-grade teacher, he has coached basketball and football at the youth levels before.

The Corona del Mar High junior varsity girls' water polo team captured the Dolphin Invitational on Thursday, beating El Toro, 11-3, in the championship game at Dana Hills High. The two-day JV tournament featured eight teams, also including San Clemente, Laguna Hills, Dana Hills, Santiago of Corona, Capistrano Valley and Irvine. Corona del Mar was led by goalies Erica Weed and Maddy Lanfried, as well as field players Caitlin Brandenberger, Eliza Britt, Shannon Frome, Kampbell Gritsch, Bobbi Hoose, Grace Morgan, Annie Mortimer, Ashley Quinn, Brianna Westrup and Natalie Wong.

The dolphin topiaries that have become Corona del Mar's center-of-town mascots are overgrown and shaggy and need professional help, the Corona del Mar Business Improvement District's board members decided Thursday morning. "Are they anchors? Are they bombs? Are they manatees?" said C. Scott Palmer. "They just don't look like dolphins. I would like the B.I.D. to hire an expert to take them back to a dolphin-ary shape. " The dolphin topiaries, which are placed in the median of East Coast Highway and Marguerite Avenue, were planted in 1993.

The Mariners Christian School Dolphins continued their volleyball dominance chalking up Christian Athletic League of Orange County championships for the sixth-, seventh- and eighth-grade boys. The sixth-grade team was led by the outstanding play of Landon Monroe, Nate Ferdi, Scott Schweitzer, Spencer Lawrence and Jack Garell. The boys lost Game 1 to a strong Crystal Cathedral Academy team that had several eighth-graders on the team. But the MCS Dolphins were resilient and came back to win the second game and the decisive third game to claim the first sixth-grade championship in many years at MCS. Other key plays were made by Luke Seidman, Seifu Pierce, Leyton Bond, Brock Malliet, Colin Pipkin, Mark Schaefer, Scott Benson, Robbie Gehring, Trenton Rhodes and Ryan Toffoli.

The South Coast Swim Conference kicked off its season Saturday, and it was a bit more important to most Corona del Mar-Newport Beach swimmers than most opening days, as it featured the defending champion Newport Hills Killer Whales against their neighborhood rival Harbor View Dolphins in the always friendly but hotly contested Battle of the Greenbelt. Elementary and high school friends, water polo and swimming club or high school teammates and greenbelt neighbors all put other activities on hold, so they could swim their hardest to claim local bragging rights.

Domoic acid poisoning is suspected in the deaths of two dolphins that washed up in Newport Beach on Sunday, a Laguna Beach-based marine mammal expert said. Two adult dolphins washed ashore on 15th and 61st streets in Newport Beach with seizures and tails flapping, visible symptoms of domoic acid poisoning. They died on the beach. The Pacific Marine Mammal Center on Monday conducted necropsies on the dolphins and is anticipating results in the next 48 hours. Michelle Hunter, the center's director of operations and animal care, believes such poisoning caused the dolphins' deaths.

The sixth-grade boys' National Junior Basketball All-Net team, the Newport-Mesa Big Cats, ended its regular season in first place with a 13-1 record. The Big Cats advance to the Super Sectional Tournament this weekend in Orange County. They are vying to advance to the All-Net national tournament March 26-27 at Cal State Fullerton. The Big Cats include: Chase Garbers, Colin Pipkin, Mitch Haly, Will Rodosky, Jacob Jones, Chase Furey, Matthew McDonald and Connor Kincaid.