Sailors let it slip away

IRVINE — Coach Bill Barnett waited and waited during three breaks. The third one is the one he expected to take in the CIF Southern Section Division I finale.

As for the score at halftime, most were in shock. Barnett wasn’t one of them. The Newport Harbor High girls’ water polo team enjoyed a four-goal lead over undefeated Dos Pueblos of Goleta.

Minutes earlier, the power went out on the scoreboard for the second time in the second quarter. Next was a torrential downpour.

The pool at Irvine High looked like a giant Jacuzzi.

Barnett liked what he saw. He looked more than ready for his traditional dip in the pool after the section championship game. He has taken it four out of the previous five times on this stage.

“I thought I was going for a swim,” Barnett said.

The closest Barnett got to getting soaked was because of Saturday’s rain. The showers stopped, but the Sailors were still unable to weather the storm.

Top-seeded Dos Pueblos stormed back in the second half. The Chargers scored five goals in the final 14 minutes and shut down the second-seeded Sailors to pull off an impressive 8-7 comeback victory.

On Coach Danelle Little’s birthday, Dos Pueblos defended its crown. She turned 32 as her Chargers turned 31-0. What a way to close out a perfect season.

The Sailors (25-6) almost ruined it.

Barnett felt the Sailors, who had a 7-3 lead at halftime, failed to finish the job. The loss stung the legendary coach, who suffered only his second section title loss with the girls.

“I think we were riding our laurels from the first half,” said Barnett, adding the loss was harder to deal with than the one to Foothill in 2005.

“I thought we had a chance to upset them, and to get out [by] that much of a lead and then kind of choke, it really leaves a bad feeling.”

The feeling is due to Kaleigh Gilchrist saying the Sailors “got too comfortable” after the first 14 minutes. Everything appeared to go their way.

The defense pressed the Chargers, limiting standout Kiley Neushul to one goal in the first half. Offensively, Gilchrist scored twice in the first half. Madison McLaren found the back of the net twice with lobs in the second quarter in which Colleen McCall also recorded a goal.

Five players finished with at least one goal for Newport Harbor before halftime.

Dos Pueblos decided to give the Sailors a dose of their own medicine down the stretch.

“The nerves got to [my girls] more than I’d ever seen before in the first half,” Little said. “Our defense wasn’t working the way that it needed to [in the first half], so we decided the only way that we could do this, the only way we could make the comeback was to press all out, not hold back.”

Dos Pueblos charged right at the Sailors and beat them for the third time this season. Kodi Hill scored 44 seconds into the third quarter. Then it was Alex Hill converting a power-play goal midway through the quarter to cut the deficit to two goals.

When Katie Jackson tried to push the Sailors lead to three goals on a power-play situation late in the third, there was Sami Hill stoning Jackson’s shot near the post.

Thirty-two seconds into the fourth, the Sailors were into trouble. Kate Klippert, a staunch defender, picked up her third exclusion and exited the game for good. Barnett was livid that he lost the UC Berkeley-bound senior to a silly foul.

A minute later, Neushul went to work. With defenders mobbing the junior, she somehow fired a shot that hit the crossbar and went in for a goal. The Sailors expected Neushul to shoot the rest of the way, so she deferred to her younger sister, Jamie. The freshman delivered in the clutch.

First, Jamie scored on a shot from six meters out to tie it at 7 with 4:01 left. After the Sailors failed on a power-play opportunity 19 seconds later, the two teams turned the ball over before the Chargers earned another extra-man advantage.

Once again, Kiley Neushul went to her sister. She crossed it to Jamie, who was wide open near the weak post and scored at the 1:47 mark. Gilchrist tried to tie it late. The best chance came after a foul. From just outside five meters and 32 seconds left, the USC-bound senior let one go that looked promising until Sami Hill deflected it to her left and out of play.

“I think [against] most goalies, that shot would’ve gone in,” said Gilchrist, who was trying to make the same kind of play she made against CdM in the section final in 2008, when she tied the game with 36 seconds left and forced overtime.

The only thing that reminded Gilchrist of her previous section title appearance was how the losing team played at the end.

“I feel like we were CdM against us in the [section title game] two years ago,” said Gilchrist, who helped the Sailors rally from a three-goal deficit and beat the Sea Kings, 6-5, to win the crown.

“Just got a little too comfortable, a little too confident, and we were only halfway done with the game.”