Tars blank Vikings, again

COSTA MESA — If you set them up, the Newport Harbor High field hockey team would love to keep knocking them down, especially if it means eliminating a rival school from the postseason.

“We always like to beat [Marina], let’s put it that way,” the Sailors’ co-captain Samantha Hill said with a grin, her teammates laughing.

They had good reason to be happy with a 3-0 victory over Marina in the first round of the Los Angeles Field Hockey Assn. Tournament of Champions Tuesday at Harper Community Center.

Shannon Rohan opened up the scoring for the Sailors (19-5-2) with a goal to give them the 1-0 lead at halftime.

The pressure from both teams continued with back-and-forth play until Hill scored the Sailors’ second goal, cleaning up the junk in front of the net and putting Newport up 2-0.

With a comfortable lead and time continuing to tick off the clock, Newport kept pushing and kept running which created more scoring chances.

Chelsea McDonald scored the Sailors’ third and final goal, on an assist from Rohan, who passed the ball in front of the goal from the top of the circle.

A shutout was the same result two months ago when Newport Harbor, the Sunset League champion, defeated Marina, 4-0.

“We saw the outside lanes very well and were able to connect from the center of the field to the midfielders on the outside,” Coach Devon Kelly said. “We looked to connect those dots and get it down the sideline and then strike it across the goal. We saw the width of the field much better than before. That was the key to the game.”

Defense “came to the party” as well, according to Liz Tennyson, who helped out with five steals.

The first round is done, but the Sailors will not have much time to celebrate.

They will play at Harvard-Westlake today and will battle on artificial turf, which runs much faster than on grass.

“It’s been less than a week since we’ve played on that field and we lost there last week,” Kelly said. “I think we are ready to play on that surface again. It’s really fast and we have to play some serious defense.”

With its win over Marina, Newport Harbor has checked one rival off the ever-growing list and will look to take down another self-proclaimed rival school in Harvard-Westlake, a team that has a reputation of playing dirty, several Newport Harbor players said.

“We need to not let them get in our heads and just play hard,” Tennyson said. “We have to play like we did today.”

ANDREW SNYDER may be reached at (714) 966-4616.