ZANBALLER

Girls who, like Zan Hagen, would prefer even the ""infant game"" of volleyball to dancing and consider the cancellation of girls' basketball season due to repairs in the school gym an ""international tragedy"" will savor her vindication as she leads her Catch-11 all-girl football squad to victory in an exhibition game with a neighboring school's junior varsity and wins the season's MVP award out from under the nose of a hard line chauvinist. Alas, there's a male brain behind all the female brawn as Zan's genius friend Rinehart coaches the girls from his reading acquaintance with the sport. And those less single-minded than Zan may not wholly appreciate her sarcastic appraisals of her dancing teacher (""an aged Shirley Temple"") and every phenomenon not directly related to team sports. Still, the satire is often directly on target -- with the principal advising Zan to turn to ""less aggressive, less tomboyish"" pursuits such as baton twirling and the naugahyde upholstered quarters of the boys' team an insulting contrast to the girls' moldy locker room. Football stardom may still be an impossible dream for Zan's real life counterparts, but it's not too soon to suggest that many of them may be dreaming it just this way.