Simi Valley Second-Best to Oxnard for a Night

The new kid on the block beat up the reigning neighborhood bully Wednesday night when Oxnard High defeated Simi Valley, 68-56, in a nonleague boys’ basketball game at Oxnard.

The Yellowjackets (7-2) had a 43-12 record the last two seasons but were never regarded as the best program in Ventura County because Simi Valley went 56-7 during that period and 104-17 the last four seasons.

Oxnard did not advance past the second round of the Southern Section Division I-AA playoffs in the last two seasons, while Simi Valley played in the I-A semifinals in 1999 and in the title game last season, losing to state power Santa Ana Mater Dei both times.

“They’re a measuring stick,” Coach Henry Lobo of Oxnard said of Simi Valley before the game. “This game won’t make or break our season, but it will show us where we stand.”

Simi Valley lost four starters--including leading scorers Branduinn Fullove and Brett Michel--to graduation in June, but 6-foot-9 center Dustin Villepigue averaged 26.9 points and 13.3 rebounds leading the Pioneers to an unbeaten record and a No. 3 ranking in the region by The Times entering Wednesday’s game. But No. 8 Oxnard used its quickness to apply pressure to the Pioneers (8-1) from the outset.

The Yellowjackets led, 31-30, at halftime after having Simi Valley down by seven points in the first quarter and by nine in the second.

Oxnard led by eight points late in the third quarter when Ryan Bradshaw sank a 29-foot shot at the buzzer for Simi Valley.

Bradshaw’s basket might have disheartened some teams, but Lobo refused to let his players get down.

“I told them that if that’s the way they’re going to make a three-point shot, then we’ll give them that shot every time,” Lobo said. “I told them that we were playing good defense and getting after them.”

Simi Valley, which opened the season with a victory in its own tournament and won the War on the Floor tournament at Chatsworth High last week, cut Oxnard’s lead to 48-45 with 7:35 to play when Jered Weaver scored off a lob from Villepigue. But Oxnard scored the next nine points.

Jonathan Monnette started the run with a three-point shot with 6:49 left and that was followed by a Nicholas Curtis basket, two free throws by Erik Webb and a Curtis putback of a Shamir Simmons miss.

Simi Valley missed both of its shots and committed three turnovers during Oxnard’s run.

The Pioneers were 21 of 49 from the field and had 21 turnovers, thanks in part to a tenacious Oxnard defense.

“They just really out-hustled us tonight,” said Villepigue, who had 23 points. “Overall as a team, they just out-hustled us, outrebounded us and outplayed us.”

Curtis, a 6-8 senior center, scored 24 points for Oxnard, with two coming on a two-handed dunk with five seconds left for the final points.

“That just capped it right there,” Curtis said. “Most people didn’t give us much of a chance to win this game.

“Everyone was saying Simi Valley was going to beat us, but we wanted to show people what we could do. We wanted to show them that we could play too.”

Webb scored 15 points--including 11 in the first quarter-- and Monnette had 11 for the Yellowjackets, who made 28 of 53 shots, including five of 10 three-pointers.

“This was definitely our best game of the season,” Curtis said. “We had been struggling a little bit. We had had some bad practices and had some lapses in games, but I figured that sooner or later, we would put it together. . . . I’m just glad it was sooner.”

Bradshaw had 12 points--all on three-point baskets--for Simi Valley but did not score in the fourth quarter.

Weaver had eight points after entering the game with a 17.1 average.

“We wanted to make it hard for them to get the ball inside and to pressure their wings,” Lobo said. “Those two guys, Weaver and Bradshaw, can really shoot if you give them the chance.”