Simi Valley Is No. 1 West of Miami

The Simi Valley baseball team enters the season ranked No. 2 in the nation by USA Today. Westminster Christian in Miami is ranked first.

“I called the guy (at USA Today) and he said, ‘I talked to college coaches all over California and the name that kept coming up was Simi Valley,’ ” Pioneers Coach Mike Scyphers said.

Few area teams come close to the depth and experience of the Pioneers, who were 23-5 last season and reached the Southern Section 5-A Division quarterfinals.

Seven returning starters return in the field, as well as three pitchers. Among the top returnees is center fielder Kevin Nykoluk, who the past two seasons was selected the Cal-Hi State sophomore and junior player of the year. Nykoluk, a first-team All-Southern Section selection, batted .422 last season.

The pitching staff includes senior right-handers Bill Treadway (6-1, 2.86 earned-run average) and Trevor Leppard (7-3, 3.67, four saves), who was selected most valuable player of the Colonial tournament in Orlando, Fla., last year. Also returning is hard-throwing junior right-hander Bill Scheffels, who was 2-1 last season before being ruled ineligible.

DURAN DURAN

El Camino Real’s Dave Duran has won City Section wrestling championships at 103 and 112 pounds. He will try for a third Saturday as a 125-pounder in the City finals at El Camino Real.

Duran, 19-6 with 12 pins, is a persistent competitor and the Conquistadores’ best hope for a championship. Five of his losses came in the Quartz Hill 10-Way tournament. “He was very sick that day, but he just kept going anyway,” El Camino Real Coach Terry Fischer said.

STRIKING BACK

Wonder why teachers in the L.A. Unified School District are threatening to strike March 1? Sure, it has to do with a possible double-digit pay cut, but increasing dissatisfaction with the overall state of affairs also has been cited.

Darryl Stroh, the football and baseball coach at Granada Hills, has practically seen it all. And seen enough. Stroh’s teams have won five City baseball titles and another in football. Few have more trophies on their mantle, yet few are more outspoken about the deterioration of the district.

“This has to be the worst school district in the entire nation,” he said. “Nothing gets fixed, there’s no money for anything, stuff is falling apart around us. . . .

“I woke up at 3 o’clock in the morning and tried to think of one reason why I shouldn’t walk into the principal’s office the next day and quit.

“I could go on and on and on for two hours and never say the same thing twice. It’s brutal, just brutal.”

SCOUT’S HONOR

Perhaps Taft High basketball Coach Jim Woodard ought to consider it a compliment.

As Taft prepared to play Kennedy in its regular-season finale Friday, North Hollywood Coach Steve Miller walked through the door. Taft (11-9) will face second-seeded North Hollywood (24-1) in the first round of the City Section 4-A playoffs today.

Miller, whose streaking team is ranked ninth in the state by Cal-Hi Sports, deigned to scout so-so Taft? Woodard almost keeled over in shock.

Whelped Woodard upon sighting the Huskies’ coach: “Miller! You’ve got to be kidding. Why are you here? Wow.”

Taft, it should be pointed out, did not climb above .500 until last week, and only after Campbell Hall forfeited a victory over the Toreadors.

EXIT LINE

Granada Hills wasn’t able to send retiring Coach Bob Johnson out with a victory Friday in the team’s finale.

The Highlanders gave it a run before falling to Reseda, 66-60, in overtime. Granada Hills had beaten Reseda a week earlier for its lone North Valley League victory. Was the upbeat Johnson--who coached basketball at Granada Hills for 25 years--downcast for once? Not at all.

“I was really proud of the team,” Johnson said. “We had ‘em for a while, but it got away. We battled all the way.”

EXIT LINE II

He waved a white flag. An official flagged the White wave. And John White told his team to go home.

With the Sherman Oaks CES girls’ team trailing, 78-18, after three quarters of its East Valley League game with Sylmar on Friday, White, assistant principal at Sherman Oaks, demanded that the fourth quarter be played with a running clock or he’d take the team off the floor.

He was informed by an official that the clock must be stopped during free throws. White then ordered Coach Lisa Lewis to gather the team and leave.

BIG BOOST

With standout senior swingman Matt Steffe slowed by an injury and foul trouble, Hart needed a lift in its Southern Section first-round playoff game with visiting Buena last week.

Seniors Scott Obermeyer and Matt Shafer were up to the task.

Obermeyer, a 5-foot-11 guard and tenacious defender, and Shafer, a 6-3 forward and skilled shooter, provided a spark for the Indians in the third quarter when the outcome was in doubt.

Obermeyer did a good job helping to execute the Indians’ motion offense and also made a timely three-point shot. Shafer scored five points in the quarter (seven in the game) to help deflect some of the pressure to score from Steffe.

Hart won, 79-71.

“They did exactly what we needed,” Coach Mike May said of the reserve tandem. “Scott came in and really helped us run our offense in the second half. Matt’s scoring off the bench was very important with (Steffe) hurting.”

HANG TIME

Steffe, who led the Foothill League in scoring and rebounding, is the lone member of the Indians to dunk during a game. However, the 6-6 swingman’s escapade above the rim against Buena almost cost Hart.

With Hart mired in an offensive funk during the second quarter, Steffe brought his teammates--and the fans--to their feet with a steal and fast-break dunk. But Steffe injured his right wrist on the play, which limited his effectiveness thereafter.

“I was just trying to be a little fancy by pulling myself up on the rim and my left hand slipped and my right wrist hit the backboard,” Steffe said. “It really hurt a lot after that.”

Said May: “I want him to go up strong. It was just one of those unfortunate things that sometimes happens. He just kind of got tangled up.”

Steffe, who was also plagued by foul trouble, had problems catching and shooting the ball. Despite the pain, Steffe managed to score 18 points and grab a game-high 13 rebounds.

Doctors who treated Steffe initially were convinced the wrist was fractured. But further examination of X-rays revealed no breaks.

FIRST-YEAR BLUES

Finding positives in a 2-17 season is hard. But that hasn’t stopped first-year Sherman Oaks CES Coach Ed Weathersby from searching.

The Knights won only one Valley Pac-8 Conference game, but Weathersby knows he need only look at a few opponents’ records from last season to find encouragement.

Monroe finished 7-11 last season, but rebounded to go 20-3 and become the top-seeded team in the City 3-A Division playoffs. Likewise, Canoga Park finished 2-20 last season, but the Hunters (10-10) have clinched a playoff berth, the school’s first in 10 years. “They got it turned around, so it gives me hope,” Weathersby said. “I have a enough confidence in my abilities to get the job done.”

ANYBODY BRING A MAP?

The Crescenta Valley basketball team made it to its Southern Section playoff game at Arlington High in Riverside.

Barely.

The Falcons showed up 40 minutes before a 7:30 p.m. start, because the weather had complicated the journey. The trip that should have taken 90 minutes took three hours, about 45 minutes of which was spent driving around Riverside.

“We finally get out to Riverside and the off-ramp we were supposed to get off at was washed out,” Coach John Goffredo said.

The bus driver exited and got back on the freeway in the other direction, but there was no exit at the proper street in that direction. The Falcons finally found the school at about 6:50.

Crescenta Valley won, 57-43, after leading only 19-14 at halftime.

QUOTABLE

L.A. Baptist Coach Maury Neville, on his next coaching opponent, Lou Cvijanovich, who won his 700th game in 35 seasons at Santa Clara last week:

“He’s been coaching up there longer than these kids have been alive. He’s been coaching there longer than some of their parents have been alive.”

MOTIVATIONAL MOVE

Westlake girls’ Coach Len Locher created a firestorm of protest from several players and parents when he told his team earlier in the season that he would not submit the Warriors for an at-large berth in the Southern Section Division II-A playoffs. The Warriors would have to earn a spot, Locher declared.

“I told the girls that going to the playoffs should be an honor,” Locher explained. “I wasn’t going to do anything that was going to embarrass this program and the players who have worked hard to build it.”

Locher’s tactics worked. The Warriors defeated Camarillo, 45-41, in their final Marmonte League game to finish fourth and earn a playoff berth. And Saturday night, Westlake upset Katella, 57-47, in the first round of the playoffs. It was only the fifth loss in 23 games for Katella, the Empire League champion.

SONS ALSO RISE

Without question, the Harvard-Westlake baseball team leads the region in franchise players.

How’s that? Two Harvard players are members of families that own major league baseball franchises.

Catcher Kevin O’Malley is the son of Dodger owner Peter O’Malley and infielder Ted Werner’s father, Tom, is chairman of the group which owns the Padres.

David Coulson and staff writers Steve Elling, Jeff Fletcher, Vince Kowalick, Paige A. Leech and Jason H. Reid contributed to this notebook.