1994-95 ALL-VENTURA COUNTY GIRLS : Basketball Team : Player of the Year : Simi’s Cooper has Scorekeepers Busy

About the only problem Tawnee Cooper presents to Simi Valley High girls’ basketball Coach Dave Murphy is an accounting one.

Murphy, an economics teacher at the school, is accustomed to crunching numbers. But when he picks up his calculator, he can’t bring himself to punch in Cooper’s statistics.

For the second consecutive season, the 5-foot-9 junior forward led Ventura County in scoring, totaling 624 points. She averaged 21.5 points and set a school free-throw record, making 78.7%.

The Times Ventura County Player of the Year helped the Pioneers set a school scoring record with 1,956 points (67.4 per game), shattering the old mark by nearly 200 points.

The result was a 24-5 overall record, 12-2 in Marmonte League play, and a berth in the Southern Section Division I-AA quarterfinals.

With her senior season remaining, Cooper has a shot at Cheri Graham’s school-record 1,381 points set in 1979-81. Cooper has 1,056 points in her two-year career, so the record appears just a couple of jump shots away.

But the math doesn’t compute for Murphy. Because Cooper played her first varsity season at Royal, Simi Valley’s cross-town rival, Highlander points (432) will never make the Pioneer record book.

“Only her Simi Valley scoring counts,” Murphy said.

Cooper has no quarrel with the bookkeeping. Besides, she has other goals on her mind. Although she said replacing Graham in the record book would be gratifying, her objective for next season is more fundamental.

“I’ve got to learn how to dribble,” she said.

She was only half-joking. A skilled all-around player, Cooper played the front court this season but must master the perimeter game to enhance her value as a college prospect.

“I’m going to be an outside player in college, so that’s what I’ve got to work on,” she said.

But before college recruiters occupy her thoughts, she wants to savor the remainder of her high school career. She has no regrets about transferring to Simi Valley, despite her initial fears.

“I thought leaving everybody would be a lot tougher, but it has been a good move,” she said.

A good move is what Cooper remembers best about the 1994-95 season. When Simi Valley defeated Rialto Eisenhower on the road in the second round of the playoffs, Cooper completed a 360, spin move to the basket that even the home crowd admired.

“Normally, I block out the crowd, but that time I heard them,” she said. “My parents and everybody were talking about it after the game. To beat them at their place and to hear the crowd, that was the best feeling I had all season.”

Better than scoring 40 points in her first matchup against her old teammates at Royal?

“I was nervous but ready to play before that game,” she said. “(My old teammates) didn’t have much to say after that.”

As Cooper cements her identity as a Pioneer and makes a run at the school record book, her Royal days seem far off. But not to Cooper. Her first season at Simi Valley went by too fast.

“It seems like I was just playing at Royal,” she said. “We started winning (at Simi Valley) and having fun and the whole season just flew by.”