Newport wins Battle

IRVINE — Corona del Mar High Coach Aaron Chaney was honest with his Sea Kings.

The day before the Sea Kings played Back Bay rival Newport Harbor for a chance to advance to their third straight CIF Southern Section Division I girls’ water polo championship game, Chaney told them about their chances Wednesday.

“If we played Newport 10 times, [the Sailors] beat us nine out of 10 times,” Chaney told his team.

“We didn’t have to play them 10 times [in the playoffs]. We only played them one time.”

The one time wasn’t the time CdM pulled off the upset.

The second-seeded Sailors led by as many as four goals before beating the third-seeded Sea Kings, 8-6, in the semifinals at Irvine High. Newport Harbor moves on to its sixth section title game under Coach Bill Barnett.

Barnett was all smiles after the Sailors’ defense stifled the Sea Kings for three quarters. Newport Harbor (25-5) plays defending champion Dos Pueblos of Goleta on Saturday at 6:30 p.m. at the William Woollett Jr. Aquatics Center.

“I love it,” said Barnett, who later learned the top-seeded Chargers (30-0) defeated fourth-seeded Los Alamitos, 9-8, in the semis. “We’re there.”

The Sea Kings (21-9) aren’t in the big game. Newport Harbor squeezed them out of another trip. The Sailors are looking to claim their second section title in three seasons and Barnett’s fifth with the girls.

How the Sailors qualified is easy. In the first half, Kate Klippert scored four goals, Kaleigh Gilchrist added two goals, and then goalie Krissy Burger made some big saves late.

The extra-man advantage was the key to Newport Harbor building an 8-4 lead after three quarters. The Sailors went six for seven on power-play situations in the first 21 minutes of action.

The only time CdM was able to slow the senior duo of Klippert and Gilchrist down was in the second half. The Sea Kings changed strategy in the final seven minutes, using a press. The move was a little too late as CdM fell to Newport Harbor for the second time this season.

“We didn’t do a good enough job knocking down Klippert and Gilchrist,” Chaney said. “It’s not a surprise. All their games they’ve been playing down the stretch, it’s all been Klippert, all Gilchrist. I check the scores all the time. I don’t know if the girls are … in awe by them or what. We just got to shut them down.

“Newport comes out in a hard press. They’re difficult to play in a hard press. You just try to move and hopefully get a few calls, but that’s where I think I screwed up. I should’ve gone to a hard press earlier.”

The Sea Kings were hard pressed to return to the title game, which they’ve dropped the previous two seasons. They were young this season, with only two returning starters, Victoria Kent and Margot Money.

Money was the one who scored the game’s first goal. Three minutes in, the senior converted a power-play goal. She tied the game at 2-2 with a lob late in the quarter.

After the first seven minutes, Newport Harbor ran away, outscoring the Sea Kings, 6-2, in the next two quarters. Gilchrist and Klippert each scored twice during the stretch and Colleen McCall and Katie Jackson each found the back of the net once.

Money recorded a hat trick at the 4:07 mark in the fourth quarter. The goal cut the deficit to three. The Sea Kings twice had golden opportunities to get closer with 2:41 to go.

CdM earned back-to-back power-play situations in a 70-second span. Each time they failed. Burger played a role in thwarting the Sea Kings’ attack.

“I really wanted to win this game,” said Burger, who ended up giving up a power-play goal to Cassidy Papa with 33 seconds left before finishing with six saves. “It would be nice to play Dos Pueblos because we could be the ones that beat them [and end their] winning streak.”

Newport Harbor has played the Chargers twice this season, each resulting in a loss. In one of the games, the Sailors competed without Gilchrist.

Chaney believes there’s no better coach at this stage than Barnett.

“Heck, he’s an Olympic coach,” Chaney said of Barnett, who is 4-1 in girls’ section championship games. “When you play Newport, there’s no gimmick plays or trick plays, it’s just straight up water polo. You’ve just got to be ready to play straight up water polo.

“The hard part about Newport is having to play offense against a heavy press. They kind of rely on the referees not calling it. If the referees don’t step up and make calls, then it makes it hard on any team. If they let the players play in that type of defense, one team gets to play and the other one doesn’t.”

Newport Harbor is the team that gets to play again, while CdM doesn’t.