Oaks Christian girls’ water polo stymies Newport Harbor for Open Division title
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WALNUT — Two unexpected teams made the CIF Southern Section Open Division girls’ water polo championship match, each coming off thrilling overtime victories in the semifinals.
Only one of them felt that it had to work for respect even before the season began.
“Every preseason, we’re always underrated, boys and girls,” Oaks Christian coach Jack Kocur said. “That may be just our location, we’re far away from everybody [in Orange County]. Every year, our goal is to overachieve the expectation of the water polo community.”
Nobody could doubt the Lions after the performance they put on Saturday at Mt. San Antonio College, putting the clamps on a deep Newport Harbor team.
Oaks Christian beat the Sailors 7-5 in the Open Division final, denying Newport Harbor its eighth CIF crown.
Instead, the No. 4-seeded Lions (22-7) claimed their second title, and first in the top division. They earned their second impressive victory of the week after rallying to win at top-seeded Mater Dei on Tuesday.
Junior left-handed attacker Mia Fabros scored a team-best three goals for Oaks Christian, and junior attacker Nicole O’Neill scored twice. Junior goalkeeper Alexandra Stoddard made 11 saves as the Lions held the Sailors to a season-low goal total.
No. 3 Newport Harbor (24-6) had knocked off two-time defending champion Orange Lutheran to make it to the final, on a sudden-death goal by sophomore Gabby Alexson. Kocur said executing a drop on Alexson was the focus for his squad.
“They have a strong center game, they’re so disciplined in their front-court offense,” Kocur said. “They’re a phenomenal team. The program, the history, they are the Lakers, they are the Boston Celtics of our sport, at least in our eyes … We played the percentages. If we take away the center, we force them to take outside shots, the percentages will eventually land in your favor. [They scored] five goals, guys. Five goals. Unbelievable.”
Sophomore Madison Mack led the Sailors with three goals. Her second strike gave Newport Harbor a 2-1 lead midway through the first quarter, but they wouldn’t score again until into the third quarter as Oaks Christian took a 6-2 lead.
“Right out of the gate, we didn’t have any urgency to want to win,” said Sailors senior Harper Price, who had two steals and a field block. “I just think the whole game, we kind of relaxed … Very winnable game. It’s just really frustrating because this team had a lot of potential and still does. We didn’t execute the way we wanted to. Everything we talked about, we did the opposite, which is very frustrating.”
Freshman Campbell Pence netted a cross-cage strike, before Mack’s third goal brought the Sailors within 6-4 entering the fourth quarter. Valery Verdugo fed Emerson Mulvey for a quick inside goal, and Newport Harbor rallied to a single-goal deficit with 3:39 remaining in the game.
Verdugo drew a counterattack exclusion, and the Sailors called timeout to set up a play. But no one shot until Oaks Christian had drawn even, and Verdugo’s attempt was easily gobbled up by Stoddard.
On the other end, Lions sophomore Makena Bygrave scored a power-play goal with 2:12 left, giving her team an insurance goal.
The Sailors went scoreless in their six power-play opportunities.
“Tuesday night, we played at a really high level, but in order to win you’ve got to play even at a higher level,” Newport Harbor coach Ross Sinclair said. “We learned that lesson the hard way, unfortunately … There was no intent in the whole six-on-five, zero intent to move into open space, set up a teammate. That’s the urgency and intent that we didn’t have. It’s a good learning lesson.”
Freshman Addison Ting had a pair of assists before fouling out for the Sailors, and Alexson drew a pair of exclusions. Senior goalkeeper Lydia Soderberg made eight saves.
Newport Harbor often made whole line substitutions this year, and has several talented underclassmen who will return next year. But the Sailors also had strong senior leadership.
Each senior is not hanging up her cap just yet, including Soderberg and Gigi Rimlinger (both going to UC Santa Barbara), Price (Cal), Sutton Harrington (Marist College) and Caitlin Stayt (UC San Diego).
“All of this senior class, we’re playing in college,” Stayt said. “Ross was telling us that we have a choice to make right now, whether we want to take this game and kind of sulk about it, or we want to use it to propel us forward in life and in college water polo, too.”
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