Hawaii Grown: College Athletics
Al Chase
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Yamaguchi swings hot bat for Bearcats
Grant Yamaguchi (Mid-Pacific '03) leads NCAA Division III Willamette with a .392 batting average and five home runs. The junior first baseman has seven doubles, the team's only triple and 18 runs batted in. His 53 total bases are tops for the 13-7 Bearcats.
Yamaguchi was a Northwest Conference honorable mention selection for the week ending March 13.
Teammate Kelsey Nakata (Mililani '05), a freshman right-hander, was a NWC honorable mention selection for the week ending March 6. He is 3-0 with a team-leading 2.16 ERA in seven games.
» Chris Loo, a left-hander for Pacific University, also was an NWC honorable mention pick for the week ending March 13. Loo (Iolani '02) picked up his first win of the season on March 11 with six innings of two-hit ball in a 16-0 romp over Whitman. For the season, Loo is 1-3 with a 3.57 ERA.
» In the three-game series with Whitman, Scott Yasumoto (Pearl City '03), a sophomore, was 7-for-10 at the plate with a double, triple and six runs scored. The center fielder is hitting .348, third best for the 9-9 Boxers.
» Jordan Shibata (Aiea '04) is second among the Lewis & Clark College regulars with a .375 batting average and leads the team with 31 hits through 21 games. The sophomore shortstop and leadoff hitter is 9-for-11 in stolen-base attempts for the 7-14 Warriors.
Nagata sets new high for Anteaters
Chelsea Nagata became the first female swimmer from UC Irvine to qualify for the finals at the NCAA Women's Swimming & Diving Championships with a time of 53.18 seconds, also a UCI record, in the 100-yard butterfly prelims.
In the finals at last weekend's meet in Athens, Ga., the sophomore from Maui High School finished seventh with a time of 53.76.
Nagata competed in two other events, finishing 34th in the 100 backstroke prelims in 55.54 and 42nd in the 50 freestyle prelims in 23.21.
Ueno wins a pair of golf invitationals
Whitney Ueno, a freshman from Hilo High School, won the Willamette Invitational women's golf tournament on Monday by two strokes with an 83-85--168 total at the Illahe Hill Country Club in Salem., Ore.
Ueno also won the first tournament of the spring, the Lewis & Clark Invitational on March 3-4 by two strokes with rounds of 86 and 78 for a 164 total. She was named the Northwest Conference women's golfer of the week for that effort.
» Lauren Yoshimura, a freshman from Pearl City at Pacific University, shot a 97-99--196 to finish seventh Monday.
» In the Lewis & Clark Invitational, Emily Lau (Iolani), a junior at Puget Sound, was fourth with an 80-88--168.
» Sarah Sheffield (Keaau '04), a sophomore at Gonzaga, finished tied for 17th with a 13-over 157 (81-76) in the Northern Illinois Snowbird Invitational at Tampa, Fla., last Thursday.
» Reyn Tanaka (Mid-Pacific '04), a sophomore at Gonzaga, finished with an 80-75-78--233 on Saturday to tie for 57th place in the Bearkat Classic at Huntsville, Texas.
Tanoue fires way to All-America honors
Michael Tanoue shot a 582 to help the Nevada Wolf Pack to a fourth-place finish in the NCAA air rifle championships at Colorado Springs, Colo., on March 11.
Tanoue, a junior from Saint Louis, earned All-America status in air and small bore.