Prep Review : Loss Merits Upsetting Discussion

Simi Valley High School’s 97-69 victory against top-seeded Capistrano Valley in the semifinals of the CIF Southern Section 4-A playoffs Tuesday was one of the biggest upsets in many basketball seasons.

It wasn’t just the result that was shocking--it was the whopping 28-point margin. Unheard of.

Everybody had a favorite theory with “overconfident” preferred over “peaked too early” by a 7-1 margin. It seems unlikely that a team which leveled its first three playoff opponents by an average of 27 points could be accused of peaking too early.

There were the usual off-the-wall theories, too.

For example: Was it possible that the Cougars, who have lost in the semifinals in three of the last five seasons, were susceptible to a semifinal jinx?

Capistrano Valley Coach Mark Thornton dismissed that as “voodoo,” which is not known to be among the forces governing basketball.

A better explanation for Simi Valley’s stunning victory margin is this: Unlike most teams, Capistrano Valley had no experience mounting a comeback.

The Cougars were the ultimate front-runners. They had never played their way back into a game the entire season.

In 29 previous games, the Cougars trailed down the stretch only once--against Mater Dei. And the Monarchs made sure Capistrano Valley didn’t learn anything about the mechanics and psychology of staging a rally.

The Cougars’ only other loss, to Santa Monica, occurred on a shot at the buzzer.

“We’re not a good comeback team,” said Thornton. “We were never behind--except in two games.” The second game was the loss to Simi Valley.

“Of course, the team was very disappointed,” Thornton said. “I told them we can’t judge a great season on one game. Three of the kids have signed Division I scholarships and all the kids who played had a good time. . . . Hopefully, they’ll be able to forget it.

“But a coach never forgets. I won’t be able to forget it until we play the first game of next season and win one.”

Despite the ending, the Cougars had a tremendous season, compiling the best record (27-3) in a school history glittering with fine records.

And Thornton may be right about the players being able to get over the disappointment.

The day after the game, guards Nathan Call and Scott Stark, a couple of three-sport athletes, changed uniforms and contributed three hits between them in an 11-7 baseball victory against University.

The life of an athlete goes on.

Something old, something new, something borrowed, something ... Orange?: The Orange High School football team expects to return to a stadium of its own this fall--at Chapman College, half a block from the high school.

Orange has played its home games at El Modena’s Fred Kelly Stadium for the past 15 years.

But with four Orange Unified School District teams vying to schedule games at Fred Kelly, Friday night home games were difficult to come by.

Orange was winless in 1985, and many boosters believed that a return to the old stadium would be a big psychological step toward revitalizing the program.

Some boosters remember attending the original Orange High School, located on the Chapman College site until 1951.

“Since I’ve been the athletic director, this has been a goal of mine,” said Athletic Director David Zirkle, who graduated from Orange in 1966, when the Panthers still played at Chapman. “We just want to come home. It’s kind of been our theme.”

The Orange Unified School District Board of Education approved the plan 10 days ago.

Chapman dropped its club football program several years ago. The college agreed to allow Orange to use the stadium since high school football would not conflict with the Chapman soccer schedule.

All that remains is a formal agreement between lawyers for the college and those from the Orange County Dept. of Education, Zirkle said.

The move also involves an ambitious $50,000 improvement scheme for the stadium, whose old wooden bleachers have rotted away.

The Orange boosters are beginning to raise the money for the construction of aluminum bleachers, a press box, concession stands, ticket booth and fencing.

Zirkle has scheduled five games at Chapman this fall. His next task is to select a new coach to replace S.K. Johnson, who resigned last week. Zirkle said he hopes a new coach will be named before spring football practice in May.

Chuck Weatherspoon, the highly recruited tailback who led the Highlanders to the Central Conference semifinals last fall, says he is not sure he will attend the University of Colorado.

Weatherspoon signed a letter of intent to play football for Colorado, where his brother Anthony is the starting fullback and leading rusher.

But Chuck said he changed his mind the following day and asked Colorado to release him from his obligation.

“It’s a nice place, but I’m not sure it’s the right place for me,” he said.

Weatherspoon, who also led the county in stolen bases during the 1985 baseball season, said the idea of attending Houston has been “in the back of my mind.”

“There’s a lot of pressure about deciding where you’re going to spend the next four years of your life,” he said.

Meanwhile, Weatherspoon had remarkable success in his first try at a new sport: wrestling. After playing basketball for three years at La Habra, he switched to wrestling this season.

Despite his inexperience and weighing 35 pounds less than some of his opponents in the heavyweight division, he compiled a 17-5 record and advanced to the state championships.