Close game the whole way, 11-10 final with the winning goal coming with 2.9 seconds left - good article by Dan Albano. Both teams will head to the Masters tournament this coming weekend. What are the chances of one of these teams breaking into the top four?

Whittier and Cabrillo rolled to the DIII and DIV titles.

The six CIF-SS championship games are tonight and tomorrow night, all at Belmont Plaza in Long Beach. Then it will be the inaugural Masters tournament.

Monday Feb 26
4:30 Div III Whittier vs Ayala
6:00 Div IV Cabrillo vs Arroyo Grande
8:15 Div II Laguna Beach vs Agoura

Tuesday Feb 27
4:30 Div VI El Segundo vs Saddleback
6:00 Div V Murietta Valley vs Redlands
8:15 Div I Foothill vs Montebello

Article about Foothill’s four seniors from Foothill HS website
OCvarsity: Albano interviews Kealy McLain after the semi

Poway beat Carlsbad 13-9 in the San Diego DI final
SignOnSanDiego.com article
North County Times - box score

DII was a little closer as rivals Bishops & Coronado met once again in the finals - Bishops won 6-5 to capture their fourth straight championship
SignOnSanDiego.com article

The Irvine Tournament concluded tonight with Stanford beating SC 10-8 in the Semis (same score as last weekend, without the 18 ejections & 5 players majored) and following that up by mobbing the Bruins 8-4. This was certainly a shock…more news as it comes in.

Semi update from Gostanford.com: Stanford advances with 10-8 win over USC

UCI’s tournament website with results & box scores

Goaztecs: SDSU Water Polo wins two 

Gostanford.com: Stanford wins Irvine Tourney with 8-4 win over UCLA 

OCRegister: Irvine 5th in Water Polo Event 

CIF Semis going now…we will complete the update later. In the meantime:

Foothill 4-3 over Newport…had 3-0 lead. Newport could not hit on man-advantages.

Agoura 8 Santa Barbara 6…close game. Can’t remember the last time we didn’t see Santa Barbara playing in a final (they had 22 straight playoff wins).
Laguna Beach beat Villa Park

Montebello barred in three goals, CDM barred out three goals. Montebello wins 8-7. CdM’s 22 straight playoff win streak snapped.

The Daily Pilot provides the story as always:
Newport-Foothil story
CdM-Montebello story

Friday links for HS fun:

 OCRegister breaking down final four

CIF names Chelsea Smith-Carmichael has earned the Spirit of Sport Award

The top college teams are back at it - this is the last of the big ones before conference tourneys in late April.

UCI’s site has the schedule and hopefully will update the scores.
Tournament website
Current week’s Top 20 poll

Loara is the latest team to forfeit in the CIF playoffs (see Capo Valley).  This time for an ineligible player.

OCRegister/Dan Albano: Loara forfeit 

Totally random, but interesting.  So,as you may or may not know, the surge of women’s water polo has a lot to do with Title IX and the desire of athletic departments to increase its number of female athletes.  People in the sport are excited, people outside the sport put us in the same breath as equestrian, squash, and now, bowling as these sort of pseudo-sports put together to hit title IX requirements.  Anyway, there is a now a national championship for bowling…how bout that?

Title IX Blog: Bowling Emerges 

Last year’s DI finalists both survived with overtime wins: Newport 5-4 over Santa Margarita in sudden death (Daily Pilot article) and Montebello 13-12 over Long Beach Wilson. Foothill cruised and Division I newcomer CdM also easily advanced to the semis. Division II saw some good quarterfinals as well with only one blowout.

This sets the stage for the one of the best spectator water polo events there is - the simultaneous DI/DII semis at the Woollett Center this Friday night.

DI: Foothill vs Newport (500pm), Montebello vs CdM (700pm)
DII: Laguna Beach vs Villa Park (630pm), Santa Barbara vs Agoura (500pm)

DIII: Whittier vs Chino Hills, Temple City vs Ayala
DIV: Cabrillo vs Harvard Westlake, Glendale vs Arroyo Grande
DV: Murietta Valley vs Centennial, Redlands vs Chaparral
DVI: El Segundo vs La Habra, Saddleback vs Valencia