U.S. Defeats Italy to Win Holiday Cup

Pierluigi Formiconi, coach of Italy’s women’s water polo team, insisted his players were victims of bad officiating Sunday in the final of the Holiday Cup tournament.

“Italy don’t touch anybody,” he said, hopping backward to emphasize his point.

The scratches on Ellen Estes’ neck and chest and the tear on the front of Ericka Lorenz’s swimsuit, however, said otherwise. “It usually gets to be pretty physical when we play Italy,” Lorenz said. “It’s not really a game I look forward to. I’m just glad we came out of it with a win.”

The rugged play, which led to the ejection of Italy’s goalkeeper and gave the U.S. 13 extra-player advantages, overshadowed a five-goal performance by driver Gabrielle Domanic and a three-goal effort by Lorenz in a 13-8 U.S. victory at the USA Water Polo National Aquatics Center in Los Alamitos, the team’s fourth consecutive tournament title.

“I think they made a spectacle of the whole thing,” said U.S. Coach Guy Baker, whose team had lost to Italy in preliminary-round play. “We use these things for training. I don’t think they came to play. I think it was planned. They got here at 3 o’clock [for] a 3:30 game and just go through the motions and get out.

“It’s unfortunate. We worked pretty hard for our tournament. It should have been a better final. But I was proud of our team. I think we did a great job. I thought we kept our composure. I don’t think we got caught up in the shenanigans that were going on.”

Perhaps mindful of the roughness of the teams’ previous match, referees Hector Valcarce of Argentina and Gideon Reemenet of the Netherlands let little go Sunday.

Goalkeeper Francesca Conti was sent off in the second quarter with the U.S. leading, 2-0. Formiconi said she was trying to tell officials the back of Estes’ swimsuit was open and Estes should go off for repairs, but her gestures were misinterpreted. Estes said that if her suit was down “it’s because they pulled it down,” but wasn’t sure.

“Argentina is for polo, not water polo,” Formiconi said, mimicking a polo player astride a horse. “He is not a referee for water polo.”

Among the bright spots for the U.S. was the play of Domanic, a Foothill High graduate who has deferred her enrollment at UCLA until after the Olympics. The U.S. lead was 5-4 at halftime and Italy stayed within two for a while, but Domanic broke it open with two extra-player goals in the third quarter, a left-handed throw with 3:22 left and a deflected shot with 2:34 to play.