Ventura Stars Finally Shine in 4-1 Wild-Card Victory

For a short period of time, forward Mike Enfield of Ventura High played like a national team player who earned a scholarship to UCLA.

Teammate Brian Anderson played like a state Olympic Development player.

It was the first time this season Enfield and Anderson played up to their ability and the combination hurt Simi Valley.

Anderson scored three goals in overtime made possible by Enfield to lift Ventura, third-place team in the Channel League, to a 4-1 overtime victory over Simi Valley on Wednesday in a Division II wild-card game in Ventura.

“I told the boys to get the ball to Mike and Brian up front,” Coach Todd Tackett of Ventura said. “I knew they were on their game [Wednesday]. I knew if we got the ball to them we’d have success.

“We have a state [Olympic development player] and a national team player and they had to come through for us, and they did.”

The Cougars advanced to a first-round game at Quartz Hill on Saturday.

Ventura (14-6-4) dominated the first 51 minutes, outshooting the Pioneers, 12-1, but eight saves by goalkeeper Miguel Morales kept the game scoreless.

A fluke goal in the 61st minute gave Simi Valley (13-10-1) a 1-0 lead.

While dribbling at the edge of the goal box with the ball in danger of rolling out of bounds, Jaime Rodriguez crossed the ball hoping a teammate was near the far post.

Instead, his shot hit the post and caromed off defender Armond Richards of Ventura and into the goal.

“There’s no way that was a shot,” Tackett said. “Our goalkeeper thought he was crossing the ball to the back post.”

Simi Valley had countless other opportunities to score in the second half. The Pioneers dominated the rest of the game, outshooting the Cougars, 11-1.

But Enfield gave Ventura the play it needed to send the game into overtime.

More than three minutes into injury time, Enfield split two defenders and crossed a ball across the goal mouth to Shane Wilkes, who headed it past Morales to tie the score.

“At first we jumped all over them,” Tackett said. “We had a couple of chances, we didn’t capitalize and then we took it easy in the second half.

“In the second half we got outplayed until the last 30 seconds.”

With Simi Valley stunned, Ventura controlled the 20-minute overtime.

Anderson scored in the 82nd, 96th and 100th minutes, giving him 20 goals this season.