1993 TIMES BASEBALL: All-Ventura County Team : COACH OF THE YEAR : Coach Made Playoffs Simi Valley’s Turf : Mike Scyphers: He earns honor a third time.

Accolades and awards, Mike Scyphers has in abundance. What the fiercely competitive baseball coach of Simi Valley High wanted more than anything this season was a Southern Section championship.

Scyphers and the Pioneers came close but didn’t get it, losing to Esperanza, 3-0, at Anaheim Stadium in the Southern Section Division I final. For Scyphers, who has piloted a dozen Pioneer teams into the playoffs, this season’s finish ranked among the most disappointing in his 15 years at Simi Valley.

“We’re still taking it kind of hard, I think,” Scyphers said. “The one thing I said to (the players)--it’s no consolation right now--(but) as time goes by, you will feel that we accomplished a whole heck of a lot.”

Yet few coaches in Southern California come close to matching the accomplishments of Scyphers, The Times’ Ventura County coach of the year who also received that honor in 1989 and 1991.

Simi Valley always seems to have talent. But each year, Scyphers has molded the team into a solid and spit-shined machine that pressures and sometimes pounds opponents into submission.

“Scyph,” as he is affectionately known to players, holds a tight reign, paying strict attention to the smallest of details to get the most out of players.

Simi Valley (27-4) stormed to a 13-1 Marmonte League mark to post its ninth league title under Scyphers and sixth in nine years. In April, the Pioneers won the championship of the prestigious Upper Deck tournament at Cal State Fullerton, topping a field of some of the nation’s best high school teams.

Winning high-profile tournaments has been something of a sideshow for Scyphers’ teams over the years. Simi Valley won the Colonial tournament in Orlando, Fla., in 1986 and ’92.

For much of this season, Simi Valley was ranked No. 1 in the nation by USA Today, an honor the Pioneers also enjoyed in 1986. That season, Simi Valley was led by pitcher Scott Radinsky, now a member of the Chicago White Sox.

And that season also ended with a crushing blow. Scyphers compares this season’s disappointment to 1986, when the Pioneers were eliminated by Esperanza in the semifinals, 6-5, after blowing a 4-0 lead.

“I think I took the ’86 loss harder than this one,” he said. “We were ahead and they snatched it from us in the bottom of the sixth with a two-out, two-run home run.

“This season, being ranked No. 1 in the nation, winning the Upper Deck tournament and getting to the finals is something no other team in our school’s history has ever done,” Scyphers said. “That’s all we have.”

With Scyphers in the dugout, Simi Valley has a lot more.