JUNIOR COLLEGE BASKETBALL PREVIEW : Valley Teams Face Rebuilding Year and a Difficult Conference Schedule

Jim Stephens’ mood was dim.

As an energy-saving measure, workmen were installing new lights in the Valley College gym earlier this week and Stephens, the men’s basketball coach at the school, did not think it was a very bright idea.

“They say it’s going to be brighter, but it’s not--it’s yellow,” Stephens said. “You can’t film in there.

“I guess I’ll have to wait until they get them all in. I’m afraid I’ll be afraid to see what happens.”

As with all of the Valley-area junior college basketball coaches, Stephens also is taking a wait-and-see attitude in regard to his team.

Valley finished 13-20 overall last season and 10-4 in the Southern California Conference, good enough to land the Monarchs into the state playoffs where they lost in the first round to Hancock.

This season, the Monarchs join Canyons, Moorpark and Glendale in the tough Western State Conference, which also features perennial powers Ventura and Santa Monica.

Valley will attempt to survive the WSC without Steve Ward, who averaged 24 points a game last season but is redshirting this season because of academic problems.

Andre Harrell, a transfer from West Los Angeles who was expected to start, is also academically ineligible.

That leaves the 6-foot, 6-inch Oral Elrington as the Monarchs’ main man. Elrington averaged 15 points a game last season and was all-conference despite a finger injury that caused him to miss several games.

“We’re going to be as good as he’s going to be,” Stephens said.

Sophomore forwards Sean Williams and Gerald Franklin should ease some of Elrington’s burden, along with 6-7 freshman Andre Bouvay from Manual Arts High.

Tory Stephens, a freshman from San Fernando High, is one starting guard. Freshman Joey Manliguis, who played at Cleveland, was to be the other until he left the team and returned to his family in New York. If Manliguis returns--he was scheduled to arrive Wednesday--he will give the Monarchs a young but talented backcourt.

“When these kids get some experience and start jelling, we can be a lot better than last year,” Stephens said. “But it’s going to be tougher to win games because the conference is so much tougher.”

Lee Smelser, who begins his 20th season at Canyons, knows all about the rigors of competing in the WSC. Canyons was 18-14 overall last season and 8-5 in conference play, then lost to Compton in the first round of the playoffs.

This season, Smelser is relying on a nucleus of sophomores, including 6-0 point-guard Kevin Price, 6-5 forward Steve Goldman and 6-3 swing man Loren Cash.

Canyons is off to a 1-3 start but should improve if 6-7 freshman forward Deon Myricks (Crenshaw), 6-2 guard Steve Valenzuela (Hart) and redshirt freshman Larry Allbritton continue to develop.

“We’re running the ball trying to play up-tempo,” Smelser said. “I think we’re going to have a little more balanced attack than last season.

“It’s going to take a while. This team has the potential to be good, but right now there’s a lot of ifs.”

Moorpark College is similarly thin in terms of experience; 11 new players are on a 13-man squad.

Coach Al Nordquist, in his 22nd season with the Raiders, has only 3 sophomores, none of whom started last season. Forwards Alex Porter (6-6) and Steve Murphy (6-4) are Moorpark’s only returning players from last year’s team, which finished 15-13 overall and 5-8 in the WSC.

The Raiders (3-0) will get their first real test in the PONY Tournament of Champions at Saddleback College, beginning today.

Nordquist is banking that Moorpark’s shooting talent can overcome the Raiders’ inexperience and make the team competitive in the WSC. Moorpark finished last in the Southern Division last season.

“This is a really good shooting team,” Nordquist said. “We’re not as big as Ventura and don’t have as many great players as Santa Monica, so we have to play intelligent to be in the race.”

Moorpark will have trouble making up for the loss of players such as Tom Neumayr, an All-WSC selection who averaged 15.5 points last season and is now at UC Davis.

Also gone is David Bussey, who averaged 10.3 points last year and led the team in steals (72); Fred Parks, who averaged 10.6 points as a freshman; Jerry Markray; Rich Murphy; and guards Gerard Walker and Todd Johnson.

Porter and Steve Murphy were Moorpark’s top players off the bench last season. They will be expected to provide leadership for Moorpark’s 10 freshmen.

Guards Charlie Cangelosi (6-1) from Westlake High and Bruce Watson (6-6) from Thousand Oaks are Moorpark’s top freshman prospects. Eric Ross, a transfer from Las Vegas is Moorpark’s third sophomore.

Glendale Coach Brian Beauchemin was optimistic about this season after his team went 10-2 in summer-league play.

Since then, 4 of the 5 starters have left the team--2 joined the Navy, 1 joined the Los Angeles Fire Department and another left because of financial difficulties.

A squad composed entirely of first-year players remains.

“There’s nobody for them to mirror off of and that’s set us back a little bit,” Beauchemin said.

The Vaqueros don’t have much size in the frontcourt but Beauchemin says he was impressed with the play of 6-4 forward Gary Fowler in a game against East Los Angeles College last Friday. Fowler scored a team-high 22 points and had 10 rebounds.

Dave Swanson (6-5) and Clarence Williams (6-5, 230) start at power forward and center, respectively. The backcourt is composed of Vigen Serop (5-11) and Bruce Heicke (6-1).

Staff writers Sam Farmer and Ralph Nichols contributed to this story.