CSUN ALUM GOES EXTREME IN U.X. OPEN.

Byline: DAVE SHELBURNE Golf

Cal State Northridge alumnus Ed Galvan added more heat to a hot 12 months for CSUN golf last week by following watershed victories by former Matador Bob Burns and current Matadors Beth Allen and Brad Uptgraft with a significant championship of his own.

After Burns, the 1990 NCAA Division II champion, won for the first time on the PGA Tour (Walt Disney Open last October), and Allen became the Matadors' first Big West Conference champion in April, and Uptgraft became the fifth CSUN golfer to win the Los Angeles City Men's Amateur title, Galvan wound up playing, literally, at the highest championship level in school or alumni history.

Competing on 10,500-foot Snowmass Mountain in Aspen, Colo., and playing on a course that had no greens, no fairways you'd recognize as such, but plenty of hazard, the 44-year-old teaching professional from De Bell Golf Course in Burbank won the fifth U.X. Open championship.

That, despite bogeying his final hole, which played to a mere 1,220 yards.

``Driver, 6-iron, 4-wood, 6-iron, 4-wood, 9-iron,'' Galvan described his winning tactics on the closing, downhill par-5, which he concluded with an eight-foot pitch shot into the 20-foot circle that constituted the cup - that after he hit the 4-wood 340 yards on his fifth shot.

Galvan finished 3 under par in the eight-hole, 4,462-yard championship, which had hiking boot-shod finalists playing uphill and downhill on rocky fairways littered with waist-high grass and flanked by rough that included trees, high bushes and bigger rocks.

All of it in an autumn-approaching glory Galvan said was nearly as breathtaking as the altitude.

``It was quite beautiful, seeing the leaves turn color,'' said the De Bell instructor, who fought off the difficulty of breathing and some severely sloped stances to hit the ball straight enough to leave the mountain with some color of his own. He left with the winner's traditional red velvet jacket as well as a granite trophy.

He also wound up with a fiancee and a reunion/showdown with a longtime golfing friend.

Galvan's girlfriend, Pam Chandler, accepted his proposal of marriage at Aspen two days before the championship. Then, Ric Moore - Galvan's high school and junior college teammate and current Bakersfield Country Club professional - earned the last qualifying spot the day before the championship.

Moore, who played with Galvan at Alhambra High and on a state junior college-championship team at East Los Angeles, was in the final twosome with Galvan as both survived the first seven holes of the nine-man final that eliminated one player on each hole.

``It was fantastic,'' Galvan said of his first final in two attempts at the U.X. Open. The 1982-84 Matador, who earned his berth for Aspen by shooting 2 under par in a qualifier at Mammoth Mountain, said he was looking forward to next year's event.

``It's fun for anyone who wants to challenge himself,'' he said.

--Names in the game: Tommy Armour III, who set a PGA Tour scoring record for 72 holes (254) and tied the tour 54-hole record (189) in winning last week's Texas Open by seven shots, is not all that new to shooting low scores.

His second-round 60 in the 1999 Las Vegas Invitational ties for the second-lowest score shot on tour, behind the record-59 shared by Al Geiberger, Chip Beck and David Duval. ...

Santa Clarita resident Duffy Waldorf, the one-time Taft High of Woodland Hills golf whiz who went on to earn college player-of-the-year honors at UCLA in 1985, had another big week at the Texas Open. Waldorf, who has earned two of his four tour victories at that event (1995 and '99), enjoyed his sixth top-10 finish there last week. He shot 64-69-62-67-262 to place fourth, opening his final round with three consecutive birdies to get within three shots of eventual winner and tour record-setter Armour. ...

Moorpark High junior Danny Hoffenberg, 17, won his first American Junior Golf Association tournament in his second attempt Sunday, finishing 74-73-147 in the Ashworth Postseason Junior at South Padre Island, Texas.

The effort extended a hot year for Hoffenberg and his younger brother, Matt, whose family holds membership at Wood Ranch in Simi Valley. Matt, 14, a Royal of Simi Valley freshman who has won seven consecutive Ventura County junior tournaments, recently won the Wood Ranch junior championship, ending Danny's one-year reign. ...

Jay Colliatie, director of golf and general manager at Lost Canyons in Simi Valley, said green fees will be reduced to $69 Mondays through Thursdays and $99 Fridays through Sundays on the par-72 Shadow course for the remainder of the year. Green fees on the Sky course will remain $95 and $120.

``Lost Canyons was voted one of the country's best courses by Golf Digest Magazine,'' Colliatie said. ``We want the Shadow course to be an everyday course for golfers, not just an occasional course.''...

Ron Skayhan, head professional at Brentwood Country Club and Southern California PGA Section Player of the Year the past two years, shot 69-69-68-69-275 to tie for 13th in last week's Mark Christopher Charity Classic at Empire Lakes in Rancho Cucamonga.

Fast-starting former Notre Dame High of Sherman Oaks golfer Kyle Kovacs tied for 57th at Empire Lakes, shooting 67-72-73-73-285 in the Nationwide Tour event won by Monday qualifier James Oh, who shot 65-66-66-71-268, then defeated Jess Daley in a three-hole playoff.

In winning, Oh, 21, replaced current PGA Tour player David Duval as the youngest player to win on the Nationwide Tour.

Dave Shelburne, [phone]

dave.shelburne(at)dailynews.com

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ON THE GREEN

- Dave Shelburne