Newport Harbor finds perfection to win Division I water polo title
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Colin McKibbin scored four goals and Myles Christian had 11 saves as top-seeded Newport Harbor defeated second-seeded Northwood, 11-3, to win the Southern Section Division I water polo title Saturday at William Wollett Jr., Aquatics Center in Irvine.
The dominating victory by Newport Harbor gave the Sailors their 12th section title and turned back Northwood in its second consecutive championship game appearance. The Timberwolves lost to Sea View League rival El Toro last year.
‘All year we’ve been stagnant. We didn’t come out hard and we had to finish teams in the second half or overtime,’ McKibbin said. ‘Finally, we got this mindset that we had to put teams away. We’ve been trying to reach perfection all year.’
Actually, they focused on perfection from midseason on. After an 8-7 double-sudden death victory over Northwood at midseason, Newport Harbor started to really examine its performances, so much so that it began to rate them on a scale of 1 to 10.
Sailors players and coaches scrutinized performances, individual and team, looked at effort, looked at how each quarter went, looked at everything they could, hoping for the perfect 10.
They finally got it.
‘All season we were struggling,’ Newport Harbor Coach Jason Lynch said. ‘I told them after the game, ’10.’ They were totally focused.’
Northwood Coach Chris French agreed, calling it one of the finest performances ever in a title game.
‘I’ve seen a lot of CIF championship games, and they were just phenomenal,’ French said. ‘I was hoping whatever they brought we could match, but sometimes, you just have to step back and say that was good water polo. It was a phenomenal game they played.’
Clinton Jorth, Andy Hayes and David Linden each scored twice and Brandon Parole had one goal for Newport Harbor (27-3).
There was no letdown either. Newport never trailed and took a 2-1 lead into the second quarter, when it scored five consecutive goals. Twice, in the second and third quarters, Newport scored with less than 10 seconds left on the game clock. It led going into the fourth quarter, 10-3.
Northwood (16-11), which trailed at halftime, 7-1, got all three of its goals from Jonathan Colton.
-- Martin Henderson
-- Image from z.about.com