GOLF BEAT\TEAM SPOTLIGHT.

Byline: Dave Shelburne and Vincent Bonsignore

Here come the Lancers: Three-time defending champion Granada Hills might be the team to beat, but Grant is the team to catch.

That's the early, waterlogged outlook in City Section golf, where Grant has dodged enough rainstorms to forge a 3-0 record that includes wins over Granada Hills and '95 City runner-up Birmingham.

Grant coach Howard Levine isn't all that new to championship contention. His Lancers won two straight City titles before Granada Hills started its run, and they came within a stroke of tying the Highlanders for the City title in '94.

Levine's latest bunch is an interesting mix. The Lancers blend three state-tournament returnees with a youthful support group that is being brought along, on and off the course, by Jordan DiNapoli, Sean Oriti and Tyler Foster - the above-mentioned veterans, who also are the team's only seniors.

Whenever Grant's underclassmen need a lift - literally, as in transportation to and from matches, or the inspirational kind of timely encouragement - DiNapoli, Oriti and Foster have been the come-through guys.

Levine calls it one of the closest teams he has coached and gives most of the credit to the leadership of his three musketeers and the way they promote their all-for-one-and-one-for-all philosophy.

"We try to give them confidence," Oriti said of the team's young players. "We tell them not to try too hard and we make sure they don't think it's their fault when something goes wrong."

Not much has gone wrong. In addition to their 3-0 league start, the Lancers also have had their three seniors combine to win both of the City's Top Gun tournaments (Oriti and Foster with 5-over-par 77s at Wilson, then DiNapoli with another 77 at Rancho Park on Monday).

DiNapoli sounds as thrilled about the progress of Grant's young players, most recently sophomore Jack Lindy, who shot 89 in a rainstorm Wednesday at Hansen Dam.

"Last year, he had trouble breaking 100," DiNapoli said. "That's tremendous improvement."

Not all the progress has been at the back of the pack. Oriti shot a personal-best 73 - one over par - in that Wednesday rain, further fueling the Lancers' optimism.

"This year," Foster said, "Granada Hills is the team to beat . . . and maybe us.'

Whatever the Lancers accomplish this season will rest largely on Levine's three seniors, and the Grant coach is plenty comfortable with that.

"They're absolutely interchangeable," he said of Otiti, DiNapoli and Foster, who had distinctly different starts in golf.

Foster, introduced to the game at age 9 by his grandfather, has honed his skills playing for the Griffith Park golf team, drifting late into Southern California Junior Golf Association competition and winning an SCJGA tournament last summer at Crystlaire CC.

Oriti, the player Levine calls his "grinder," for his ability to scramble and score no matter how he is playing, has never taken a lesson. But he learned the game early from a golfing family that has dad, brothers and all his uncles playing the game. He used to practice with the Lancers as an eighth-grader because his older brothers knew so many of the Grant players.

DiNapoli, the most accomplished junior golfer of the three, got started at age 13 when he went to a youth baseball camp which took an off-day trip to a nine-hole pitch-and-putt golf course. "I haven't picked up a bat since," said DiNapoli, who finished fourth in City last year and won the Dove Canyon Invitational junior golf tournament last summer.

TENNIS BEAT PLAYER SPOTLIGHT

Dynamic duo: When Nick Murphey was a sophomore and Eric Grindlur a freshman at Kennedy two years ago, they came out for tennis with the goal of earning spots as singles players.

Their skill level wasn't high enough at the time to crack the lineup. So Kennedy coach Craig Raub decided to make them a doubles team.

Two years later, it looks like a stroke of genius.

Murphey and Grindlur have developed into one of the best doubles combinations in the San Fernando Valley. Their solid play this year has helped the Cougars get off to a 3-0 start.

"It was just one of those things that worked out," said Raub, who will allow both players to compete in singles matches this year as a change of pace. "They spend a lot of time working on their game and it's just come together for them."

TREND WATCH

Fast start: Things might not be as bad for Granada Hills as originally thought. The Highlanders suffered a setback early on when four players departed the team. One left as a transfer, one was the victim of an academic suspension and the other two decided to devote more time to study and work, respectively.

But despite the losses, Granada Hills is off to a fast start, having beaten Monroe and Van Nuys, among others, to serve notice that it can be a factor.

"I think we can be right there all year," Highlanders coach Ron Wood said. Smart team: No matter what Burbank does this year, it won't be for lack of intelligence.

The Bulldogs sport an entire roster maintaining a 4.0 grade-point average or better, led by Matt Baker, who has been accepted by Harvard and Brigham Young. Add Burbank: The Bulldogs are adept on the courts, as well. They opened Foothill League play with an 18-0 trouncing of Saugus Thursday to improve their overall record to 4-1.

Rain rain, go away: The recent rain storms have left a number of teams scrambling to get in matches and practice time. For some of the older, more experienced clubs, it's not that bad. But for younger teams it's a different story.

"We've been getting clobbered by the weather," said Westlake coach Grant Calkins, whose Warriors are made up of several underclassmen.

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Photo Oriti