THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, August 26, 1994 TAG: 9408240181
SECTION: PORTSMOUTH CURRENTS PAGE: 19 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: The Sports Editor
SOURCE: Bill Leffler
LENGTH: Medium: 71 lines
Notes on a frayed white cuff. . . .
Portsmouth's new academic rule to require D-plus averages of all high school athletes will keep several from participating in fall sports.
The rule requires a 1.3 grade point average. Past summer school grades are included in determining what a student's grade point average will be when school opens in September.
The school board has approved a policy to raise the requirements to be eligible for extracurricular activities to a 1.7 grade point average next year and to 2.0 in 1996.
Chesapeake schools are following the Virginia High School League requirement of passing five classes per grading period to play sports. Students with six classes can fail one and still compete.
Portsmouth delayed one year in implementing its new policy.
In posting back-to-back undefeated regular seasons the past two years, Norcom's football team has registered some impressive statistics.
In the 20 victories, the Greyhounds scored 665 points while allowing only 49. The 1992 team had a 327-23 edge over opponents. Last year's state championship squad had a 338-26 advantage.
Fourteen of the wins in those two seasons were shutouts.
It's the Olive Branch Youth Football and Soccer Association that is constructing the concession stand at Wilson High School and not the Little League.
The football/soccer group is working to shift its entire program to the Wilson and Hodges Manor Elementary School complexes.
Dennis Bagley, who assumed the presidency of the football/soccer association this year, is hoping to add a meeting room atop the concession stand, which is under construction at the south end of the Wilson track.
``One of our big goals is to start a drive to get lights on the football field at Wilson,'' Bagley said. ``We hope to do this in cooperation with the Recreation Department through its incentive fund.''
Bagley estimates the lighting would cost about $30,000. ``We know it might be three or four years down the line but we hope to start working toward doing it,'' he said.
``We want to work this out with the high school and meet all requirements of the Virginia High School League in the lighting. It will be more expensive in meeting the VHSL requirements.
Immediately ahead is raising about $2,000 to build the meeting room.
Since the football and soccer group has severed ties with the Little League, the program has grown. ``Once we were down to about 120 kids,'' Bagley said. ``Through the efforts of the past two presidents and the many volunteers, we now have about 400 children in our program.''
Victory Lanes has scheduled a nationally sanctioned duckpin tournament honoring longtime area bowler Herman Gaines.
The Herman Gaines Open, a five-game handicap tournament, will be held for three weekends beginning Oct. 1. It will carry a $50 entry fee and will offer a $1,000 first prize. It will have unlimited reentry, but a bowler can win only one of the top three prizes.
Gaines, now a mechanic at Victory Lanes, long ranked among the area's premier duckpin bowlers and was a No. 1 rated bowler in Portsmouth in past years. He formerly was the lanes manager at Bowlarama in Norfolk.
He once was a runner-up finisher in the United States Open.
Former Eastern Amateur golf champion Ralph Howe is now playing the Nike tour.
He tied for fifth place in the weekend Texarkana Open, winning $8,625.
Howe is the only lefthander ever to win the Eastern Amateur. He won in 1986, defeating Tim Loustalot in a playoff. by CNB