The Santa Barbara High girls water polo team opened up the Tournament of Champions with a convincing 11-5 victory over Murrieta Valley, but fell 10-9 in overtime to Los Alamitos in its second game of the day.
In the early game, Kelsey O’Brien and Charlotte Hendrix dominated right from the start. O’Brien finished with five goals, three assists and five steals while Hendrix had four goals, two assists and three steals. Madeline Trabucco had an excellent game in goal with 12 saves.
The Dons cruised to an easy victory behind the two players’ nine combined goals.
The later game proved to be more of a challenge. Heading into the weekend, Santa Barbara was ranked second in Division I CIF while Los Alamitos was ranked seventh.
O’Brien and Betsy Hendrix had three goals each in the match.
Sophie Trabucco took a pass from Rosie Fesembeck and scored her second goal of the game with 43 seconds remaining to tie the score at 9-9 and force overtime.
The Dons were unable to get the game winner, and Los Alamitos scored to end the game with 1:30 remaining in the extra period.
Santa Barbara will have its first meeting of the season with Channel League rival Dos Pueblos in a consolation round game at 10:05 a.m. Saturday at Santa Barbara High.
