Harvard-Westlake’s Davis Wachtell defends Mater Dei’s Jack Seybold. The Wolverines defense held Mater Dei to three goals, none in the second half. (Presidio Sports Photos)
Harvard-Westlake captured its second straight championship at the Santa Barbara Invitational on Saturday after a comfortable 12-3 victory over Mater Dei in a battle of the No. 1 and No. 2 teams in CIF-ss Division 1.
The No. 1 Wolverines pulled away by not allowing Mater Dei to score in the second half. The Monarchs’ last goal came with 5:49 still remaining in the second quarter.
“The most important stat to me is the three goals we gave up,” said Harvard-Westlake head coach Brian Flacks. “The goalkeeping was great but I think defensively we were phenomenal. Defensively as a team we did a really good job of getting stops and forcing them into really tough situations.”
Mater Dei head coach Chris Segesman is looking forward to seeing how his team improves throughout the season. The weekend tournament was the first competition of the fall season for both teams.
“We’d like to have a better game than we did, I think we’re better than we played today but Harvard is a good team. They make you pay for your mistakes and we made too many mistakes,” Segesman said.
Harvard-Westlake’s Ben Hallock scored five goals in the championship match.
The two teams, who will meet again in the regular season in a non-league match, both have a CIF championship as their ultimate goal.
“I’m obviously very proud and happy that we came out with a win today, but most importantly we know there’s lots of places where we can improve and get better, so I think hopefully this motivates us and isn’t the highlight of our season,” Flacks said.
Ben Hallock led Harvard-Westlake with five goals in the championship game. Duncan Froomer added three goals.
The Wolverines defeated Huntinton Beach, 11-7, in the semifinal game earlier on Saturday. Mater Dei edged Loyola 10-7. Loyola came back to top Huntington, 7-6, in the third-place game.
Santa Barbara High won its final two matches of the tournament on Saturday to finish in 13th place. The Dons, who opened the tournament with a win over Los Osos before losing twice on Friday, survived Santa Margarita 8-7 and then Agoura by the same score.
Adam Gross scored five goals in the win over Santa Margarita and made a key field block in the fourth quarter of the second game that helped preserve the win. Evan Blix scored the game winner against Agoura with 2:45 remaining in the contest. The Dons had led 7-3 but allowed Agoura to tie at 7-7. Santa Barbara killed 9 of Agoura’s 11 man-down situations.
Dos Pueblos won its morning match over Cerritos, 11-10. Dylan Elliott scored seven of the goals in the first game and six more in a 17-12 loss to Murietta Valley. Elliott totaled 26 goals in the five tournament games. Taylor Gustason collected four goals and drew six ejections in the loss to Murietta.
The Chargers don’t play again until the South Coast Tournament in late September.
