Flintridge Prep water polo overwhelmed by No. 1 seed Righetti
PASADENA — Flintridge Prep’s boys’ water polo team won its first playoff contest as a member of CIF Southern Section Division IV in the first round to earn a quarterfinal matchup with the division’s defending champion, Righetti High.
On Saturday afternoon, back in the pool at Pasadena Polytechnic, the visiting Warriors demonstrated why they are the top seed in this year’s bracket by overwhelming the Rebels in the first period before cruising to a 16-4 win, ending Flintridge Prep’s season.
“I haven’t seen a team like that,” Flintridge Prep coach Dan Hare said. “Not just this year, but even when I played. I would just say extremely well-coached and extremely disciplined. We tried everything we could. We were going to go in there and take the tempo out and you saw where that got us.”
In the first quarter, Flintridge Prep (18-6) was dominated by Righetti (20-3), which scored seven goals while shutting out the Rebels. Warrior Caleb Sandberg tallied the first goal of the game when he collected the rebound of a shot that had hit the cage and put the ball in the back of the net with 5:38 remaining.
Righetti scored three of its next four goals with a one-man advantage as the Rebels struggled to defend without fouling. The run included another score by Sandberg, who would finish the game with four goals.
Righetti scored three goals in the first quarter’s final 1:30. This included two of Warrior Ryker Dacus’ game-high six goals in a span of 20 seconds, followed by a final goal at the horn by Andrew Rivera.
Flintridge Prep got things a little more under control after the disastrous first, allowing just three goals in each of the final three periods, but the damage was done.
“I’m happy the game didn’t look like the first quarter the entire time,” said Hare, who took over the program in 2010. “I think we recognized there were little victories and little games within the game and once we got that mindset we really competed. I think we locked down on defense significantly.”
Throughout the contest, Flintridge Prep was hounded by an aggressive pressing defense that often pinned the Rebels on their side of the pool, although it was most potent in the first seven minutes.
“That was impressive,” Hare said. “That is a system that is predicated on speed and strength and my hat goes off to them.”
Trailing, 9-0, in the second quarter, Flintridge Prep got on the board when Scott Fordham scored off an assist by Sami Chmait. The junior rose up out of the water and fired a shot that snuck in just inside the right side of the cage with 1:49 to go. Dacus then put in his second goal of the period, and the Rebels trailed, 10-1, at the half.
After Dacus scored 20 seconds into the third period, the Rebels answered on the first of Sean King’s team-high two goals. The senior took a pass from Evan Havunjian on the counter-attack and skipped a shot in with 5:30 left.
After Sandberg scored again, King struck again. This time, as the shot clock ran out, the senior scored on a long skip shot that was redirected on the way into the back of the net. Dacus capped the third quarter with his sixth goal to make it 13-3 going into the final period.
“We knew we were up against something fierce,” King said. “We just couldn’t execute like we wanted to.”
The Warriors, who advanced to play in the semifinals on Wednesday at Camarillo High against El Segundo, scored the first three goals of the fourth quarter. But it was the Rebels who struck last. With the final seconds ticking away, sophomore Kasen Barraclough threw a cross-pool pass to fellow sophomore Ian Tien, who put the ball away with four seconds to go.
“It’s been a great season,” King said. “This team made a lot of history and I’m expecting great things from them in the future.”