PHOTO GALLERY INTRO: Santa Barbara High’s water polo team brought down San Marcos 14-9 on Tuesday for a Channel League victory in the Dons’ pool. Santa Barbara, the No. 9 team in CIF-ss Division 1, moves on to face Righetti on Thursday in a non-league match while the Royals battle for a potential playoff berth in their last game of the regular season next Tuesday at home against Buena. The Dons improve to 15-7 and the Royals fall to 16-12.
Santa Barbara's Skyler Matthews stole the ball and scored the Dons' first goal on this 1-on-1 with the San Marcos goalie. Matthews tallied a team-high four steals and scored three times. (Presidio Sports Photos)
Tyler Benko's five goals were not only a team-high, but also a season high for the Santa Barbara Don.
Cristian Bridley was a big part of the Dons offensive attack that started the match with eight straight goals. Bridley scored in the first quarter after a steal on defense to make the score 5-0.
This shot from Bridley, however, was stopped point blank by Royals keeper Parker Woodward.
Royals head coach Jeff Ashton called a timeout when the score got to be 8-0 in the second quarter. The Royals responded by scoring the game's next goal. From that point, San Marcos outscored SB 9-6 for the rest of the match.
Hauschild led the Royals with five goals with four coming in the second half.
Dons goalie Gio Goggia played the second half. One of Goggia's two saves on the day came in this difficult situation facing San Marcos' Keyvan Golizadeh.
San Marcos' Kameron Bebb tries to distract Santa Barbara's Peter Loomis at 2-meters while Parker Woodward waits for the shot. Loomis was one of eight Dons who scored in the match.
Santa Barbara's Alec Linz has only the goalie to beat and chooses a successful lob shot to score in the second quarter.
