Agoura ousted by Santa Barbara

The Agoura girls’ water polo team was defeated, 12-9, by Santa Barbara in the California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) Southern Section Division II semifinals last week in a match played at Agoura High School during light rain.

The Chargers kept pace with Santa Barbara until the Dons erased a one-goal deficit (7-6) with four straight goals to end the third quarter.

"It was a great effort," said Agoura head coach Jason Rosenthal. "They’re probably the No. 1 team in the nation and for us to play them that close is awesome. I couldn’t have asked for anything more. We’ve been working on stuff for a week now—on things we’d have to do—and for the most part, we did it almost the whole entire game. It came close to being in our favor. A couple of plays here or there."

Santa Barbara led, 3-2, after one quarter, but Agoura battled back to tie the score at five late in the second quarter.

Agoura closed the gap to two in the fourth quarter but Santa Barbara extended the lead back to three relatively quickly.

"We crept back in, we scored a couple of goals, we made it close again—then they pulled away from us," said Rosenthal.

Agoura faced Santa Barbara in the semifinals because the Chargers were seeded fourth instead of third.

"I would have liked for this to be the championship game," Rosenthal said. He noted that an obscure rule kept Agoura from being third-seeded and pushed Thousand Oaks from fourth to sixth.

The rule states that the top two finishers in the same league cannot face each other until the CIF finals. Otherwise, Royal (seeded No. 2) would have faced Agoura in the semis.

Cabrillo was moved from No. 5 to No. 3 to accommodate the strange rule.

"We should have faced Royal today in the semifinals and Santa Barbara in the championship game," said Rosenthal.

The Chargers end the season at 22-9 while Santa Barbara, 28-2 with the win, was set to play in Monday’s championship against Royal (which beat Cabrillo 10-5 in the other semifinal game).