Newport Harbor’s Sandberg reads the game well

Kids like to go to the beach in the summer, and Newport Harbor High senior Max Sandberg is there a lot too. Sandberg works as a lifeguard in Newport Beach.

When he wasn’t at the beach this past summer, you could find him reading “Astrophysics for People in a Hurry,” by Neil deGrasse Tyson.

You know, just some light summer reading.

“It was difficult to get through,” said Sandberg, who’s interested in astronomy and has a 4.0 weighted grade-point average at Harbor. “But I learned a lot.”

Fast forward to fall and Sandberg is in his second year as varsity starting goalie on the Sailors boys’ water polo team. Sandberg likes to be constantly learning and pushing himself, and he’s emerged as one of the top goalies in Orange County this season for the Sailors, who are ranked No. 3 in CIF Southern Section Division 1 and 2.

But last year, Sandberg did some of his learning on the job, when he earned varsity starting goalie honors as a junior following two years on the frosh-soph team. Newport Harbor coach Ross Sinclair said that Sandberg earned the starting nod, winning a three-horse race at the position.

Sandberg wasn’t so sure.

“It was a lot,” he said of a season that ended with him earning first-team All-Sunset League honors and helping Newport advance to the Division 1 playoff quarterfinals. “I didn’t think I was ready at all or deserved to play, but I was put in anyway. Looking back now, I still felt like I was extremely young, a little kid … There was a lot to learn. I definitely took the time to look at scouting reports, understand the game, watch my own film and do the best I could for my team. If I couldn’t make every block, I could make steals, or run a defense better.”

There’s a certain maturity with Sandberg, who understands how important the goalie position is. He also understands that he’s helping bring the Sailors back into the forefront in Division 1 and Orange County, somewhere they haven’t been in a while.

Sandberg made two penalty-shot blocks as Newport Harbor beat Foothill 7-4 on the road last week. On Tuesday, he made eight of his 10 saves after halftime as the Sailors shocked Harvard-Westlake, 9-8 in sudden-death overtime, on the road.

A couple of years ago, victories like these weren’t happening for Newport Harbor, and Sandberg knows it. As a kid, he watched his current goalie coach, Chris Whitelegge, star for the Sailors.

Whitelegge, who went on to play at UC Santa Barbara, helped the Sailors make the Division 1 title match as a junior in 2009. The program hasn’t been back since.

“Programs go up and down no matter what, no matter who they are,” Sandberg said. “I was really hoping that I could be a part of the team that brings it back.”

In a different universe, Sandberg would be the signal-caller in a much different sport. His father, John, was a football offensive lineman at Corona del Mar in the 1980s, and mom Sue played tennis at CdM.

Max played quarterback in Pop Warner football growing up. But come eighth grade, he decided to stick with water polo, the sport introduced to him by his teammate Ryan Brosnan.

What has improved for him this season? Sandberg said his overall play, not the least of which involves his mental game.

“I’m my own biggest critic,” he admitted. “Any time I would make a mistake, it was really hard to recover. Through the offseason, Chris and Ross just worked with me on my whole mental state. If I make a mistake, it’s not the end of the world, and it took me a long time to learn that. I need to focus not on what happened, but what I can do to prevent it from happening next time. Ross likes the term, ‘Play with ice in your veins,’ and I do my best to play in the moment and move forward from whatever happens.”

Sandberg is playing with ice in his veins lately, and that can only mean good things for the Sailors. He said he recently decided that he wants to play water polo in college.

Last spring, he was part of the Sailors boys’ swimming team’s sixth-place finish at the CIF State Championships in Fresno, despite Newport Harbor bringing just four swimmers — Sandberg, Jason Grew, Reece Hemmens and Nick Halphide — to the final meet.

“He’s the fastest kid in our [swim] program, and he’s our goalie,” Sinclair said. “Even last year, I thought he was a high quality goalie, and he just keeps getting better. But I think what makes him more special is that he’s a better person. He’s a great teammate, a great role model … He’s someone that holds himself to a higher standard, and I think that’s what drives him and allows him to be as competitive as he is.”

Max Sandberg

Born: Feb. 1, 2000

Hometown: Newport Beach

Height: 6 feet 2

Weight: 175 pounds

Sport: Boys’ Water polo

Year: Senior

Coach: Ross Sinclair

Favorite food: Pasta

Favorite movie: “Top Gun”

Favorite athletic moment: Competing against top-seeded Los Angeles Loyola last year in the quarterfinals of the CIF Southern Section Division 1 playoffs and making a couple of saves against Marko Vavic, who’s now at USC.

Week in review: Sandberg made two penalty-shot blocks in a 7-4 win at Foothill on Sept. 13, then followed that up with nine saves and three steals in a 9-7 win over The Bishop’s School of La Jolla on Sept. 16.

matthew.szabo@latimes.com

Twitter: @mjszabo