Rotary and Ralph bring home bacon

Southern Sonics and teenager netter Ralph Buenaventura scaled their respective mountains this past week in sports.

The Sonics bagged the 2005 Saipan Rotary Club Youth Basketball League title after running roughshod over a lethargic Garapan Rollers I team last Tuesday at the Gilbert C. Ada Gymnasium.

Finals MVP Rowell Aranda of Southern got the better of his match-up against regular season most valuable player Peter Iguel. The high-flying forward erupted for 47 points and got invaluable support from center Jack Lizama and guard Lester Babauta to lead Sonics to the 113-79 romp of the pennant champions.

Buenaventura, for his part, won an unprecedented third Fall Classic championship after frustrating anew Nicolas Son in straight sets 6-1, 6-3 Sunday at the American Memorial Park tennis courts. For the girls, Audrey Motto crowned herself princess of the forehands and backhands when she registered an undefeated record in the girls’ 14-and-under age group.

Other winners of the renamed 2005 Calvo’s Insurance Junior Tennis Fall Classic are Tinian’s Benjie Decena (boys’ 14-and-under), Joe Motto Jr. (boys’ 10-and-under), Thea Minor (girls’ 10-and-under), Mayuko Arriola and Lila Mailman (girls’ 15-and-under doubles), Jessica Soll and Cleo von Siebenthal (girls’ 12-and-under doubles), Dominic von Siebenthal and Joe Motto Jr. (boys’ 14-and-under doubles), and Cody Race and Rafael Jones (boys’ 10-and-under doubles).

The week also saw the executive committee for the 2006 Micronesian Games meet for the very first time Wednesday at the Governor’s Office and Bud Light-Toyota Tundra winning the pennant championship of the 2005 Budweiser Cup BANMI Men’s Island-wide Basketball League Monday with a win over Bud Ice-Hoopaholics/SaipanCell.

No Ka Oi also made the CNMI proud after winning the Budweiser King of the Diamonds Tournament of Champions at the expense of Da Boyz from Guam, 18-9, last weekend in Palau.

The youth also had several dosages of competition when the 2005 All-Schools Cross Country Championship and 13th Annual All-Schools Swim Meet took place at the CPA Airport Field and Kan Pacific Swimming Pool, respectively.

Action in the 2005 World Organized Rocball High School League, 7th Annual Miller Lite Coed Four-Person Beach Volleyball League, 2005 Commonwealth Football League, and the Fall and Masters editions of the Saipan Major League also continued last week.