Thousand Oaks, La Reina and Oak Park's Skiba are biggest winners at CIF-SS Finals

JANN HENDRY/Acorn Newspapers SHE STANDS ALONE—Oak Park High junior Melissa Skiba, shown training before the season began, finished in first place in the Division III girls' race at the CIF-SS Finals last weekend at Mt. SAC. Skiba is the first OPHS female to win a section title race. The CIFSouthern Section Finals took place at Mount San Antonio College in Walnut last Saturday, and the event produced three local winners.

In Division II, the Thousand Oaks High boys took home first place with 73 points. La Reina captured the Division IV title with 67 points, while Oak Park's Melissa Skiba finished in first place in the girls' Division III race.

Thousand Oaks' title was the first for the program since the 1994 season.

TOHS head coach Shawn Morris said the Lancers used their 16th-place finish at last year's CIF-SS Finals as motivation.

"We've done a complete 180 from last year," Morris said. "Yeah, we were in Division I last year, but we finished in dead last at the section finals. I brought it up once in practice, but to be fair, the team has used that as its motivating factor all season long."

Morris said he was nervous when he saw Loyola place its top three runners before the first Lancer crossed the finish line, but once again it was depth that helped TOHS prevail.

Asher Lober led the Lancers with a time of 15:15, 1 second ahead of teammate Sean Gildea. Kevin Joerger came in third for TOHS with a 15:25, while Andrew Snyder (15:42) and Donald Morrow (16:07) also helped blaze a path to victory.

La Reina's title was the first in school history as the Regents placed 48 points ahead of secondplace Mayfield Senior.

Leading the Regents were Sarah Pearson and Rachel Brajkovich, who finished in third and fourth place, respectively. Mary Thompson was 19th, just ahead of teammate Tara Blanchard, who came in 20th. Meghan Murphy placed 39th.

"I'm really happy for the team," La Reina head coach Robert Lopez said. "They trained all year long and put in so much effort. To see their faces when they executed what they wanted was very thrilling for me as a coach."

The Oak Park girls advanced to the CIF State Championships by placing fourth in its Division III race, with a lot of credit going to Melissa Skiba, who won the race with a time of 17:32.

Skiba became the first OPHS girl to win a CIF-SS Finals race and the first for the school since J.J. Castner won for the Eagle boys' team in 1989.

"Somebody told me back when I had Castner as a runner that I should cherish it because you only get a runner like that once in a lifetime," Oak Park head coach Kevin Smith said.

"After having coached other runners since then, such as Skiba, you could say I've coached a few lifetimes. I've been very fortunate and damn lucky to have had runners like (Skiba) while I've been at Oak Park."

Other teams qualifying for the state meet this Saturday were the Royal boys' squad in Division I, the Westlake boys in Division II, Oak Park's boys in Division III, Agoura's girls in Division III and Oaks Christian's girls in Division IV.

Individuals advancing include Heyden Wooff of Camarillo in Division II, Liberty Miller of Simi Valley in Division II, Jenny Mallen of Newbury Park in Division II, and Hunter Hays and Charlie Petrie of Oaks Christian in Division IV.