HIGH SCHOOL NOTEBOOK : Crowell Tries to Lift Desire to Level of Talent at San Fernando

The way San Fernando Coach Dick Crowell explains it, the key to his team’s 5-1 start is keeping the players fired up. The athleticism is there, he says. Motivation, well. . . .

“There are three kinds of athletes,” Crowell said. “The first kind is the pure player. The second kind is the competitor type, the guy who isn’t pretty but plays hard and works hard. The third kind is when both are rolled into one--that’s what you really want to have.

“We’ve got mainly the player types. So when we play with aggressiveness, we’re tough to beat.”

Case in point: In a recent game against highly regarded Antelope Valley, San Fernando jumped to a 29-10 lead after one quarter.

“We really played with intensity then,” he said. “When we don’t have it, we’re in trouble. When we do, we can play with anybody.”

Crowell will soon see how his players react when there’s nobody to play. San Fernando last played on Dec. 12 and won’t play again until the Eldorado tournament begins in Las Vegas on Dec. 27. That kind of layoff could temper anyone’s intensity.

Defense posturing: During a recent six-game spree that culminated last week, Granada Hills averaged 86 points a game, but that’s only the half of it.

And that’s exactly the problem.

The Highlanders (5-5) managed only a 2-4 record because their defense wasn’t much to speak of, prompting Coach Bob Johnson to speak out--and to take some unusual measures.

“I’ve started yanking guys off the floor for making defensive mistakes for the first time ever,” said Johnson, in his 12th season at Granada Hills. “But maybe they’ll get the point.”

Johnson said that his team has been guilty of settling for good offensive statistics rather than a winning final score, and that an “I-got-my-18-points-so-it’s-not-my-fault” attitude pervades the team at times.

Elbow grease: Taft Coach Jim Woodard calls it “the elbow,” and the term refers to the area at the top of the key where the free-throw line and the side of the key meet.

A little elbow room is all forward Jason Deyoe apparently needs. The 6-foot-7 senior routinely knocks down the 16-foot jump shot from that area, and he isn’t bad from other locations either.

Deyoe made 27 of 42 shots (64.2%) from the field in four games last week to lead the team to the Hamilton tournament title.

He averaged 19 points and 10 rebounds in three tournament games and was named the most valuable player.

Down and out in Quartz Hill: While Coach Don Moore was battling asthmatic bronchitis, his Quartz Hill players were battling Leuzinger in the El Segundo tournament--without their coach.

The Rebels’ 69-65 loss marked the first time in Moore’s 31-year coaching career that he was forced to miss a game. The loss, Moore admitted, made him feel dreadful.

“I felt bad, period ,” Moore said. “But I knew I couldn’t help them the way I was.”

Uneasy lies the head . . .: After Saturday’s upset of unbeaten and top-ranked North Hollywood, Grant Coach Howard Levine was wary that his team, then 7-0, would be designated No. 1 in the Valley.

“We’re bound to lose now,” Levine said Monday afternoon before his team took on Hawthorne in the Banning tournament. “We’re vulnerable. If we’re gonna be ranked No. 1, it’s only gonna be for a couple of days. It’s not like Cleveland being ranked No. 1, where they’re a dominant team. We’re not a dominant team.”

Just the reaction of an overly cautious coach, right?

Well, maybe not.

That very night, in overtime, Hawthorne handed the Lancers loss numero uno , 55-53. And loss No. 2 came Wednesday, 80-69 to Jefferson.

More of the same: Just as it was when the season began, Greg Ropes is getting nearly enough players at practices for a half-court pickup game, but not much else.

Ever since Newbury Park’s football team extended its season two rounds into the playoffs Ropes, the coach, has had difficulty rounding up players for roundball. More than half of his team was still hitting ballcarriers when they could have been hitting 15-foot jump shots. “It’s been piecemeal all the time,” he said.

There were seven able bodies at Monday’s practice. Including Ropes’.

The score card:

Back East visiting relatives: guard Jai Johnston and forward Mark Rodwell.

Having wisdom teeth removed: forward Ryan Turner.

Learning to drive: guard Jaime Martinez.

Sick: center Joe Smigiel and forwards Chris Falzone and Matt LaBelle.

Total practices with entire team present and playing: four.

All alone out there: With a 4-4 record, Simi Valley is teetering on the edge of a losing record. The downside of .500 is recently unchartered territory for the Pioneers, who have been a force in the second half of the decade.

And, while Coach Dean Bradshaw works on a plan of attack, two things are certain:

1. The Pioneers, who twice have been on the wrong end of blowouts, need to play more consistently.

2. Nobody feels sorry for them.

“We’re the only ones that can pick ourselves up,” Bradshaw said. “Nobody else will. There are a lot of people out there who are happy about this.

I don’t think I can pinpoint what it is.”

Bradshaw, however, has several options from which to choose. Among them:

* The Pioneers are shooting 44% from the field.

* In each loss, at least one opposing player has scored more than 20 points.

* In three of the four losses, no Pioneer has scored 20 or more points.

* Simi Valley’s average margin of defeat is 21 points.

Football: Montclair Prep’s Derek Sparks completed the season as the fourth-leading scorer in the state, according to Cal-Hi Sports. In 13 games, the junior running back scored 216 points, including six on two-point conversions.

Napolean Kaufman of Lompoc, was the leader with 236 points (39 touchdowns, one two-point conversion). Hart’s Howard Blackwell placed 10th with 194 points (32 touchdowns, one two-point conversion).

Clint Beauer finished tied for third in the state in receiving with 76 catches (1,214 yards).

Staff writers Tim Brown, Vince Kowalick and Brian Murphy contributed to this notebook.