Rosary in Familiar Waters With Second Straight Title

Like father, like son. Like brother school, like sister school.

But not quite like last year.

Rosary staged a second-half rally, then held off University to win the Southern Section Division IV girls’ water polo title, 6-5, Tuesday at Belmont Plaza Pool.

It gives Rosary, coached by Todd Sprague, and its brother school Servite, coached by Sprague’s father, James, section water polo titles in the same school year. Servite won the boys’ Division II title in November.

It is the second consecutive section title for Rosary (22-4), which had a much easier time with University (17-12) in a 7-4 victory in last year’s Division III final.

Expected to cruise to this year’s title since the beginning of the season, top-seeded Rosary struggled early against third-seeded University before Colie Barson, Meghan Monahan and Kelly McNeley scored in the last 1:43 of the third quarter to give Rosary a 4-3 lead.

“There’s a lot of extra pressure when you’re No. 1,” Todd Sprague said. “But when we went from down to up we started making some real nice decisions.”

McNeley’s goal, a shot from just inside mid-pool, came with two seconds left in the quarter was a back-breaker that clearly shifted momentum to Rosary.

“We were fighting and fighting and fighting and all of a sudden we get that goal from half-tank,” Sprague said. “She saw something we didn’t because we were telling her to pass it.”

Rosary went ahead, 6-3, when Julie Henn scored from two meters with 4:22 to play, but University, which overcame a 6-3 fourth-quarter deficit in its semifinal victory over Santa Monica, fought back.

Left-hander Jennifer Hallman drilled a spinning shot past Rosary goalie Britni DeGrazio with 1:48 to play and Marion Gee fired a backhand shot from two meters to pull the Trojans within a goal with 1:24 left.

But despite two Rosary turnovers in the final minute, University couldn’t come up with the equalizer.

“We felt we were the only team in the division that could give them a game,” University Coach Mike Reid said. “We worked our game plan, they worked theirs and they came up with one extra.”

University’s plan was simple: shut down Rosary two-meter player Natalie Golda, the Royals’ leading scorer. The Trojans dropped around Golda, who did not score, and took a 2-1 lead at halftime.