Back Bay classic:Tars win

CORONA DEL MAR — Newport Harbor High’s Clinton Jorth held the ball, unguarded, at the left side of the goal with just more than a minute left in the second sudden-death overtime period.

After nearly 39 minutes of Newport Harbor-Corona del Mar boys’ water polo, the game would come down to this.

All of the Newport Harbor fans in attendance yelled at Jorth to shoot. But instead he waited, drawing a defender over before passing in front to Riley Hayes, who scored his third goal of the game to give the Sailors a wild 8-7 win Tuesday in a quarterfinal of the CIF Southern Section Division I playoffs.

Newport Harbor (24-5) moves on to play El Toro (26-4) on Friday at 5 p.m. at Irvine High in the semifinals. For the Sea Kings (18-10), it is the latest in a recent string of heartbreak losses against their Back Bay rival.

“That’s the kind of kid Jorth is,” Newport Harbor Coach Jason Lynch said. “He’s totally unselfish. I was going, ‘Come on Jorth, put this thing away for us.’ But he makes one extra pass. Guys miss stuff from him in practice, because they’re not ready. That’s how far ahead of the game he is.”

Newport Harbor was also far ahead in the game on Tuesday, leading, 6-3, with less than four minutes left in regulation after Jorth’s second goal.

Hopes appeared to be bleak for Corona del Mar, playing without leading scorer Mike Berry and starter Nick Jones, who had both drawn their third major foul — earning a game ejection — earlier in the fourth quarter. Berry left with 5:06 left in regulation and Jones was gone one mintute, 19 seconds later.

But CdM stormed back, getting a close-in goal from Omar Mobarek with 3:18 left in regulation and a long goal from seven meters by fellow senior Jeff Lee, bringing the Sea Kings within a goal with 2:26 remaining in the fourth quarter.

“Coach [Barry] O’Dea says it always comes down to heart,” Lee said. “I think we were able to reach down and say ‘Hey, our team needs us right now. Let’s leave it in the pool and give it our best shot.’ I think we did that.”

Then, Ryan Hultman of CdM took Greg Sanford’s pass and side-armed it in, knotting the score at 6-6 with 47 seconds to play.

“We never thought we weren’t going to come back,” said CdM goalie Brian Peotter, who had 13 saves in the game. “We continued to play and they stopped respecting us. They didn’t respect our bench players, who are just as good as our starters. They came in and they did their job.”

A shot by the Sailors’ Blake Hockenbury with 26 seconds left in regulation went off the bar, and a follow-up as time ran out was alertly thrown to the corner of the pool by CdM two-meter defender Ryan Kent.

“It was a little different, because we’d been practicing playing defense against Berry and how to stop him with the left hand,” Hockenbury said. “But we had our opportunities. Our mistakes were when we got away from the team effort and tried to step un individually.”

Brandon Parole tipped in a power-play goal with 1:09 left in the first overtime to give Newport a 7-6 lead.

But the Sea Kings’ R.J. Baldoni scored a goal on Hultman’s long pass with 14 seconds left in the first overtime, knotting it at 7-7.

That set up a controversy late in the second overtime.

With eight seconds left, Lee drew a Newport ejection. Another Sailors player violently splashed the water, which earned another kick-out and should’ve given Corona del Mar a six-on-four opportunity.

Instead, the referees allowed Newport Harbor to substitute in a man, making it just a six-on-five instead. The Sailors survived it when goalie Bryce McLain, who had 11 saves, blocked a shot in the waning seconds.

Coaches from both schools agreed after the game that it should have been a six-on-four, but O’Dea eventually decided not to formally protest the decision.

“They made a major mistake,” O’Dea said. “It should have been a six-on-four. That’s a huge difference in the shot you’re going to get, when you only have four hands up to block the shot instead of five. At that point of the game, when you’re in the quarterfinals of Division I and you have Corona del Mar and Newport Harbor? I don’t think that kind of mistake is acceptable.

“I’m upset about it,” he added. “But at the same time, we went to overtime and had opportunities. I respect that we lost the game.”

The first sudden-death overtime was electric, as both Peotter and McLain made point-blank saves with under a minute to go. But in the second sudden-death overtime — the fourth overall — Hayes made the most of his chance from Jorth.

“We thought they were fighting back pretty hard, but we’re used to overtimes,” McLain said. “We had a few overtimes in league, so we kind of felt like we had the upper hand with that experience.”

For Corona del Mar, it is the third straight tough loss to Newport Harbor, dating back to last year’s 13-12 setback in the Division I semifinals. O’Dea hoped his team’s season still isn’t over, saying he believed the Sea Kings should earn an at-large berth into this year’s inaugural Southern Section Masters tournament.

“For the ups and downs we’ve had all season, that was one of the greatest playoff games you’ll see this year at any level,” O’Dea said. “I think this team did a tremendous job. All of the boys on our team will never forget that game. My boys became men tonight. It was a great experience.”

Newport Harbor, meanwhile, now has two days to recover and prepare for El Toro. The Tars lost to the Chargers, 8-4, on Sept. 23 in the semifinals of the South Coast Tournament.

“I think they have the best team, the most talented starting six,” Lynch said. “If they play together they’re going to be tough to beat.”

Northwood plays Harvard-Westlake in the other Division I semifinal.

CIF Division I

Quarterfinal

Newport Harbor 8, CdM 7 (4 OT)

Score by Periods

Newport 1 3 1 1 1 0 0 1 — 8 CdM 1 2 0 3 1 0 0 0 — 7

Newport -- R. Hayes 3, Jorth 2, Hockenbury 2, Parole 1. Saves -- McLain 11.

CdM -- Hultman 2, Jones 1, Berry 1, Mobarek 1, Lee 1, Baldoni 1. Saves -- Peotter 13.