Laguna finishes with easy victory

The Laguna Beach High boys’ water polo team wrapped up its regular season Nov. 2 with a convincing 13-5 nonleague victory over Mission Viejo.

Laguna, which won the Orange Coast League championship, opened the CIF-Southern Section Division II playoffs Thursday against visiting JSerra. The score wasn’t available at press time.

“JSerra will be a tough opponent,” Laguna Coach Chad Beeler said Wednesday. “They’re a young team, but they’re tough.”

The Breakers took a nine-game win streak into Thursday’s playoff opener, getting that ninth win over Mission Viejo.

Laguna took control of the match by outscoring the Diablos, 5-1, in the second quarter to open up an 8-3 halftime lead.

Pierre Masson scorched the nets for eight goals. Nathan McConnell scored three goals and Max Munoz and Preston Head both scored once.

“I feel that we’ve been playing really well despite having that week off because of the fires,” Beeler said. “We really got back into conditioning once we got back into the pool.

“We’re playing really good as a team. We’ve been working on not allowing shots to come out of the set, plus we’ve been making sure to get our hands up to block shots from the field as well as rotate in the pool to help each other out. I feel that our communication out there is much better now.”

A Laguna win over JSerra, the Trinity League runner-up, would put the Breakers into a second-round match Saturday. They would face the winner of Thursday’s first-round match between Ivy League champ Riverside Poly and Santa Barbara.

The division semifinals are set for Wednesday at the William Woollett Jr. Aquatics Center in Irvine.