SD Prep Sports:

2006 San Diego Section

Boys Water Polo

El Capitan Cowboy Invitational

Sept. 29-30, 2006 at El Capitan High School

Tournament champion - El Capitan Vaqueros

Medal Round Games
1st place: El Capitan 7, Mission Bay 4

3rd place: Clairemont 14, Ramona 9

5th place: La Jolla Country Day 15, Hilltop 6

7th place: Mar Vista 17, Mt. Miguel 11

Tournament Team Most Valuable Players
El Capitan: Austin McBrady

Mission Bay: Obed Davila

Clairemont: Luke Kinney

Ramona: Gehrig Browning

La Jolla Country Day: Vivan Suri

Hilltop: Ian Barnes

Mar Vista: Garrett Griffin

Mt. Miguel: Gary Myers

Preliminary Scores/Results
Saturday, Sept. 30, 2006
Mission Bay 14, Mt. Miguel 5
Ramona 9, Hilltop 5
Clairemont 12, La Jolla Country Day 9
El Capitan 13, Mar Vista 6
Hilltop 11, Mt. Miguel 7
Mission Bay 13, Ramona 5
El Capitan 8, Clairemont 6
La Jolla Country Day 15, Mar Vista 5

Friday, Sept. 29, 2006
El Capitan 10, La Jolla Country Day 10 (El Capitan wins shootout)
Clairemont 10, Mar Vista 9
Ramona 13, Mt. Miguel 6
Mission Bay 12, Hilltop 7

Tournament Standings
El Capitan 4-0 (includes shootout win)
Mission Bay 3-1
Clairemont 3-1
Ramona 2-2
La Jolla Country Day 2-2 (includes shootout loss)
Hilltop 1-3
Mar Vista 1-3
Mt. Miguel 0-4

El Capitan tournament team MVP Austin McBrady makes a save in the final game.

Tournament Highlights

Championship Game: El Capitan 7, Mission Bay 4
Vaqueros make a splash, win own water polo tourney
Season previews, game reports

LAKESIDE, Calif., Sept. 30, 2006 -- For the eight teams that participated in this year’s El Capitan Cowboy Boys Water Polo Invitational Sept. 29-30, just getting into the pool was reward enough, according to El Capitan head coach Robin Sanchez.

“ If we hadn’t done this tournament, these teams wouldn’t have had a tournament this year,” Sanchez said. “I think if you talked to the coaches of each of these teams, they’d tell you how happy they were just to be able to play.”

The tournament was put together in the span of three weeks after Sanchez began receiving phone calls from coaches whose teams were unable to get into either the recent Poway Invitational and America’s Finest City Invitational tournaments, both 32-team affairs. Sanchez worked with assistant coaches Bob Jeffrey and Wes Tart to put together the tournament on such short notice. Jeffrey served as tournament director. Sanchez profusely thanked both for their help.

“It’s amazing we were able to put this together in a couple weeks. I thank everyone who helped out, including the game day workers,” Sanchez said.

The tournament had a particularly gratifying end as the host team won the event via a 7-4 championship game victory against the Mission Bay Buccaneers.

With the victory, the Vaqueros improved their early season record to 6-0.

“We're off to a great start considering our numbers,” Sanchez said”We're trying to field a junior varsity team, so players are coming and going between the the varsity squad and the junior varsity team as we try to change our personnel. Our football team is so strong, with 60 to 80 players, that it takes away potential athletes from other sports. It's kind of like playing against a stacked deck. The kids who are playing for me right now are giving their hardest effort. That's more than any coach can ask.”

El Capitan navigated some early challenges to make it to the final, winning a shootout against La Jolla Country Day in the teams’ opening game of the two-day tournament after playing to a 10-10 tie. The Vaqueros followed with preliminary-round wins against Clairemont (8-6) and Mar Vista (13-6).

Clairemont topped Ramona, 14-9, to capture third place while La Jolla Country Day defeated Hilltop by a 15-6 score to finish fifth. Mar Vista downed Mt. Miguel, 17-11, to win the seventh-place game.

Each team nominated a tournament Most Valuable Player. Goaltender Austin McBrady earned honors as the Vaqueros’ tournament team MVP. Other tournament team MVPs included Obed Davila (Mission Bay), Luke Kinney (Clairemont), Gehrig Browning (Ramona), Vivan Suri (La Jolla Country Day), Ian Barnes (Hilltop), Garrett Griffin (Mar Vista) and Gary Myers (Mt. Miguel).

Brian Van Vechten, Jared Radtkey and Patrick Sellers each scored two goals to help lead the Vaqueros past the Buccaneers in the title game matchup. Tucker Warford scored one goal and McBrady made six blocks and one steal to further bolster El Capitan.

Sellers scored the only goal of the first quarter and clutch defense and goaltending dominated play. The Vaqueros, however, managed to get their counter-attack working in the second quarter, scoring two more unanswered goals (one each by Van Vechten and Radtkey) to lead 3-0 before Chuey Davila got the Bucs on the scoreboard. The first half ended with El Capitan leading by two goals, 3-1.

Mission Bay (5-4) made a game of it by scoring the opening goal of the third quarter — Davila's second of the game — to pull to within a goal, at 3-2, but the Vaqueros once again managed to put a couple of unanswered goals (one each by Radtkey and Sellers) past the otherwise stingy Jose Davila in the Bucs cage to go out in front by three goals, 5-2.

Mission Bay once again came back, this time trimming the El Capitan lead to 5-3, but the Vaqueros answered back once again with a pair of uninterrupted goals (one each by Warford and Van Vechten) to pull away with a 7-3 lead with 1:23 left in the game.

The Bucs scored the final goal of the championship match with the outcome no longer in doubt for a 7-4 final.

The sometimes-scintillating play of Jose Davila in the net kept Mission Bay in the game throughout the third quarter. The Vaqueros took a 6-3 lead only after several near-misses and stops by the Bucs goalie.

Third place - Clairemont Chiefs

Third place: Clairemont 14, Ramona 9
Bryce Cope led the Chiefs with seven goals. Clairemont used its superior speed to pile up a 9-2 first-half lead and cruised from there, extending its lead to 10-4 before the Bulldogs staged a belated rally.

Fifth place: La Jolla Country Day 15, Hilltop 6
Vivan Suri led the Torreys with seven goals. The game was close early, with Hilltop rallying from an early 3-1 deficit to tie the game at three goals apiece on shots by Ian Barnes and Justin Trinidad. LJCD regained the lead, 4-3, by the end of the first quarter and slowly built an 8-4 lead by halftime. Suri had five goals at the break while Ryan Ellerbrock paced the Lancers with two goals.

Seventh place: Mar Vista 17, Mt. Miguel 11
Mikey Ellison racked up nine goals and three assists and Miller Bailey contributed three goals and four assists to help guide the Mariners to their first victory in the tournament after suffering losses to the first-, third- and fifth-place teams in the eight-team gathering. Mar Vista dropped a 10-9 decision to third place Clairemont in the teams' tournament opener.

Ryan Barr had two goals and two assists for the defending South Bay League champion Mariners, who also received two goals and one assist from Gary Wegener and two goals from Ryan Henderlite. MV goalie Dustin Bottomly had five saves and two steals against the Matadors, who finished 0-4 in the tourney.

Gary Myers paced Mt. Miguel with eight goals.