Hoover boys’ water polo fends off Burroughs in Pacific League Tournament
ARCADIA — To take major step in defending its Pacific League boys’ water polo title, Hoover High needed to upend Burroughs in the league prelims Tuesday at Arcadia High.
The top-seeded Tornadoes executed on offense in the first half, while their defense excelled, forcing the Indians into turnovers.
Though Burroughs managed to get into a rhythm as the match went on, Hoover held its own and earned a 12-9 victory to advance to the league championship match.
“We have very good two-meter play at both ends — two-meter offense and two-meter defense — and we have very good perimeter play,” Hoover coach Kevin Witt said. “We have people that can shoot from the outside and play good, direct defense. We’re coming together at the right time. We look good.”
Hoover (7-0 in league), which seeks to secure a third Pacific League crown in four years, will face No. 3 Arcadia at the same venue at 5:30 p.m. Thursday in the championship match. The Apaches (5-2) defeated No. 2 Glendale, 12-11, in overtime Tuesday to advance to Thursday’s final.
“We’ll need another game like that, plus a little better defense,” said Witt of Thursday’s final. “I think there were a couple of goals that we gave that we shouldn’t have and not matching up off the timeouts. It was partly my fault because I was focused on the bench and I didn’t call things out. I relied too much on their communication, but other than that, not bad. We’ll be better on Thursday.”
The Tornadoes were led by senior Vedi Gharibian, who had four goals, and junior Hakop Ansuryan, who added three goals and three assists. Hoover junior Samvel Manukyan scored once and recorded four assists.
Xavier Turla, Ales Lewin, Ryan Jaramillo and Vahagan Sahakyan each scored twice for the Indians, while goalkeeper David Karagezyan had 11 saves.
Burroughs will face Glendale in Thursday’s third-place game at 4:30.
Though the Indians (4-3) struck first with a five-meter goal from Sahakyan at 5:27, Hoover responded with Ansuryan’s first goal at 4:08 to tie it at 1. He scored another goal with 2:28 left to give the Tornadoes a one-goal lead.
Gharibian scored with 1:43 left in the first and Manukyan tacked another score early in the second to give Hoover a 4-1 advantage.
Jaramillo cut the Hoover lead to 4-2 with a goal with 4:02 left in the second quarter, but the Tornadoes restored their four-goal lead with goals from Gharibian and Patrick Hagnazarian.
Pressure mounted on Tornadoes goalkeeper Oliver Baker (seven saves), who made three stops before Jaramillo broke through to score as Hoover led, 6-3, with 2:03 left in the half.
“When we’re patient and work the offense, we make things happen,” Burroughs coach Jacob Cook said. “When we rushed it, it went against us. It was just a balance of trying to get them focused and just be quick, but not hurry. Hoover’s a great team.”
Lewin made it a two-goal deficit for the Indians with 20 seconds left, but Ansuryan capped his hat-trick with six seconds remaining in the half for a 7-4 Hoover lead at the break.
“In the first half, we were really fired up and we wanted to win the game,” Ansuryan said. “Towards the second half, we got kind of sloppy. Our offense, we were trying to be creative, so on defense, we had to shut it down so they don’t come back.”
Gharibian scored twice in the third quarter to help Hoover to a 9-4 lead at 3:55. The Indians responded in the final 1:27 with a goal from Lewin and Chet Conlan for a 9-6 score after three.
Ansuryan, Gharibian and Hayk Nazaryan each scored in the final quarter for Hoover, while Sahakyan scored once and Turla tallied two goals.
In the first match of the league prelims, fifth-seed Crescenta Valley opened with an 18-5 victory over sixth-seed Burbank behind eight goals from George Saroyan. The Bulldogs (1-6) received a hat-trick from Pavel Tantchev.
Crescenta Valley (3-4) will face No. 7 seed Pasadena (0-6) at 3:30 p.m. on Thursday.
Meanwhile, the Apaches triumphed over Glendale (4-3) on an overtime game-winning goal from Timothy Lu with 26 seconds left in the second extra period.
Tied at 9 with 3:13 left, Glendale took a one-goal lead with a goal from Gevork Karapetyan. With 14 seconds left in regulation, Lu scored to force the game into overtime.
Karapetyan gave the Nitros a lead, 11-10, with 1:31 left in the first overtime period, before Christian Lowe tied it with 10 seconds remaining.
Glendale had a chance to take the lead with a one-man advantage with with 50 seconds left on the clock but the shot from Rudolf Hovhannisyan was saved.