Mark Walsh was in a quandary when he sat down to seed this weekend’s 12th annual Santa Barbara Tournament of Champions girls water polo tournament.
Picking the No. 1 seed was easy — three-time defending CIF champion and undefeated Dos Pueblos was a lock. The Chargers have a 47-game win streak going into Thursday’s tune-up against Laguna Beach. After DP, it was a tossup for Walsh, Santa Barbara High’s coach. Orange County powers Newport Harbor, Corona del Mar, Laguna Beach and Los Alamitos all had defeats on their ledgers.
“This was the most difficult year for seeding the tournament.” Walsh admitted. “In past years, there is usually a pretty clear cut between the top 4-5 teams and everyone else. This year, teams seeded from 3-7 have each beat and lost to another team in the same range, so seeding them was almost impossible. I could have made a case for each of them to be ranked as high as 3 or 4.”
After careful consideration, Walsh went with Los Alamitos, Laguna Beach, Newport Harbor and Corona del Mar as his two through five seeds. Los Alamitos and Newport have lost only once, while Laguna has two losses. Corona del Mar has four losses, but the Sea Queens gave DP a battle in the Newport Holiday Cup final, losing 9-7.
The top four seeds head four groups of four teams for this power-packed tournament that begins Friday at 12:30 p.m. (Click Here for Schedule)
The collection of elite teams for this event is staggering. The field features the Nos. 1 through 8 teams in the CIF-SS Division 1 rankings (DP, Los Alamitos, Newport Harbor, Corona del Mar, Laguna Beach, Santa Barbara, Foothill, Edison) and four of the top-5 ranked squads in Division 2 (No. 1 Agoura, No. 2 Montebello, No. 3 San Clemente, No. 5 Long Beach Wilson).
San Diego section champions Vista (3 straight in Division 1) and Coronado (3 straight in Division 3) are also entered.
Santiago and Mater Dei round out the field.
Co-hosted by Dos Pueblos, the TOC will use Santa Barbara’s pool and the Chargers’ Elings Aquatic Center. On Friday, games will run every hour through 7:30 p.m..
Saturday’s competition starts at 9 a.m. The semifinals are at 11:10 a.m. and 12:15 p.m., and the championship is scheduled for 4:30 p.m., all at Santa Barbara High.
DP opens at home against Coronado at 12:30, while Santa Barbara takes on Vista in its first match at home at 3:30 p.m.
The Dons figure to have their hands full with Vista. The Panthers return all six starters from last year’s San Diego Section Division 1 championship team, including leading scorer and Cal commit Victoria Williams.
The individual talent that will be on display in the pools is a veritable feast for college colleges. There are as many as 17 Division 1 recruits competing, including local stars Kiley Neushul (Stanford), Tiera Schroeder (Cal) and Chandler Vilander (George Washington) of Dos Pueblos and Makenzy Fowler (Arizona State) of Santa Barbara.
Other participants who have made Division 1 college commitments include:
Los Alamitos: Cory Dodson (Stanford), Savanna Smith (Cal)
Laguna Beach: Jesse Holechek (Princeton), Jessica Shusko (Santa Clara)
Newport Harbor: Catherine Carpenter (Stanford), Sarah Wilkey (UCLA)
Corona del Mar: Maddie Schwartz (San Diego State).
Foothill: Kelli Boling (San Diego State)
Vista: Victoria Williams (Cal)
Long Beach Wilson: Eike Daube (USC), Chris Baker (Cal), Erica Beebe (UCLA)
