University of San Francisco Athletics

Richard G. Stevens was born in San Francisco and raised in the outer Sunset district. He attended St. Gabriel’s Grammar School, and then Riordan High School. He played baseball for both and was selected Player of the Year annually from his championship teams in grammar school, and he earned All-City and WCAC honors at Riordan. He attended USF and played under Coach Dante Benedetti. USF’s baseball teams during the late 60s were comprised of walk-ons who were highly competitive and played against regional teams such as Cal, Stanford, Santa Clara, St Mary’s, and other members of the Pac – 8 and WCAC. His college summers were filled with playing baseball for the Cincinnati Red’s instructional league team on the west coast, selling shoes at Sears and working on the BART construction project which involved tunneling under the streets of the City and Bay waters.
 
Stevens graduated from USF in 1969, obtained his CPA license in 1972, attended a variety of Harvard Business School’s Advanced Management Programs and those offered by Stanford Law School. He founded Hunter Stevens LLC, a management consulting and restructuring firm in Menlo Park in 1995 and Menlo Atherton Capital in 2005.  Previously, he was a partner with PricewaterhouseCoopers and Ernst & Young. 
 
Over the years he has served as Commissioner of Alpine Little League, President of St. Raymond’s Men’s Club, Chair of The Easter Seals Society of San Francisco, Head of the City of Menlo Park Environmental Committee, as well as other not-for-profit organizations in San Diego and Greenwich, CT. He now resides in Menlo Park, CA.
 
This year saw an increased interest in frosh baseball as the squad grew to twenty-six players. Coach Benedetti was very pleased with the spirit and hustle shown by the team. Although the pitching was weak due to lack of experience, the defense was strong.

The team brought together many outstanding ball players: catchers Bill Mustonich, Frank Zbacnick, and Fred Fegan: shortstops Mike Delanus and John Seeronen; infielders Ron Belli, Bill Hudson, Mike Laurel, and Rick Stevens. The outfield was covered by Grant Steer, Daryl Siria, Scott Tandy, Tom McMullen, Dave Worthen, Steve Taylor, Tom Georgi, Bob Spratt, Bunkey Read, and Dennis Quesenberry. Hurlers Ron Dinslag. Bob Kokley, Jim
Armstrong, Steve Bail, Rick Hinkle, and Bill Cline rounded out the team. With the frosh teams strong defensive ability and developing pitching talent, the Hilltop can look forward to exciting baseball action (TheDon).

The Dons dented the scoreboard first with two runs in the top half of the third. Catcher Frank Zbacnik led off the inning with a single, was sacrificed to second by Rich Hinkie, and then stole third. Second-sacker Mike Laurel, up next, hit a bounding ball to the right side of the infield with Zbacnik scoring ahead of the throw. Laurel then stole second where he scored on Rick Stevens' single.

Steer broke out of his stump in a big way with a perfect 3 for 3 and two stolen bases. Scott Tandy and Bill Hutson each had two hits in the Don's 11 hit attack with Hutson's second hit chasing Rick Stevens across the plate with the winning run in the ninth. Big Mike Delagnes started on the hill for the fledgling Don's and pitched well until he ran into control problems in the fourth. Hinkle took over at that point and, after surviving a shaky 2 run fifth inning, proceeded to retire 13 of the last 14 batters to face-turn and pick up the victory. Going into the bottom of the ninth the Don's were trailing by a score of 5 to 4. After striking out Tandy to lead off the inning. left-handed Holmes got into trouble with his control. He hit Fegan with a pitch and walked Stevens and Laurel to load the bases with only one out. With third-baseman Hutson at the plate, Holmes served up a wild pitch which allowed Fegan to score from third with the tying run, and allowed Stevens and Laurel to move up to third and second respectively. Then, with the infield drawn in to cut off the run at the plate, Hutson slashed one of Holmes' deliveries up the middle of the diamond and the Don's were home free (TheFoghorn).