Sports briefs: Honors roll in for UCD swimmers

Even after winning its second Mountain Pacific Sports Federation championship in three years — and four events titles — the UC Davis swimming and diving team outdid itself on Thursday when the league announced its all-conference teams.

In addition to veteran mentor Barbara Jahn capturing Coach of the Year honors, 12 Aggie swimmers combined to earn seven NCAA B consideration times and a total of 44 All-MPSF spots (16 first team and 28 second team).

Led by juniors Samantha Shellem (800 freestyle relay, 200, 500 and 1,650 Free) and Katie Edwards (800 free relay, 200 individual medley, 100 and 200 free), with four each, eight UCD swimmers claimed first-team recognition. Other Aggies on that list are Liliana Alvarez (100 and 200 breaststroke), Bridget Bugbee (800 free relay), Marissa Brown (500 free), Hilary Hunt (100 and 200 backstroke), Morgan Lee (100 breast) and Haley Porter (800 free relay).

By winning her third straight 100 breast championship, Alvarez — a junior — has now earned first-team honors in all three of her seasons as an Aggie.

Porter and Hunt each added five second-team spots.

UCD tennis

A pair of Aggie duos picked up straight-set victories on Thursday, the first day of competition at the 124th annual Pacific Coast Men’s Doubles Championship at the La Jolla Beach and Tennis Club.

Adam Luba and Kyle Miller, the first UCD pairing to compete in the three-day tournament, defeated the independent team of Esteban and Isaac Altuna, 6-4, 6-3, to advance to the Round of 64.

Also advancing to the next round are Aggies Adam Levie and Toki Sherbakov, who downed San Diego’s Jakob Karnopp and Andrew Raphaelson, 6-2, 6-1.

UCD women’s golf

Demi Runas, who had a pair of second-place finishes for the 13th-ranked Aggies in February, was named the Big West Conference Women’s Golfer of the Month for the fourth consecutive time on Thursday.

Runas, a senior from Torrance who is ranked 13th by Golfstat, paced UCD to a pair of top-four finishes — third at the Peg Barnard Invitational at Stanford and fourth the Cal Classic — last month.

The two-time reigning Big West Player of the Year, opened her spring season by tying for second at Stanford in mid-February

Local rugby

The Blue Devil Rugby Club posted a huge win last weekend, taking down Dixon in a silver match, 54-12.

The victory was notable as it came over a team that has some of the same players as the Dixon Gold squad that won a single-school national championship in 2012.

In the lopsided win, the Devils strong performances from up and down the roster including locals Josh Greenfield, Quinn Williams, Nash Nunes, Zac Slavich, Bray Harwood, Derek Pleasants, Wally Perez, Carson Bernard, Ahmari Hayes and Oscar Sepulveda, among others.

Davis also played well in the Bronze match, with contributions coming from Anthony Pedroia, Talek Deary, Michal Goodison, David Kim, Richie Navarette and several others. The Blue Devils actually led at halftime before falling 36-19.

The Devil are home this weekend for a pair of matches beginning at 10 a.m. The bronze matchup pits the locals against Vacaville, while Northern Nevada’s Silver team is in town for Game 2. Both matches will be played at Davis High School.

Correction

Tuesday’s article on the Davis High junior varsity girls soccer team’s season-opening tournament victory misidentified a scorer. The winning goal of an overtime game was recorded by Kate Bosco with Makenna Rubinstein supplying the assist.