{"id":5454,"date":"2008-10-19T08:50:00","date_gmt":"2008-10-19T08:50:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lbpost.com\/articles\/sports\/mistakes-ruin-upset-chance-for-lbsu-water-polo\/"},"modified":"2008-10-19T08:50:00","modified_gmt":"2008-10-19T08:50:00","slug":"mistakes-ruin-upset-chance-for-lbsu-water-polo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/mistakes-ruin-upset-chance-for-lbsu-water-polo","title":{"rendered":"Mistakes Ruin Upset Chance For LBSU Water Polo"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Additional reporting by Vince Girimonte<\/span><\/p>\n

Momentum can change a game, even when it’s submerged in water.  <\/span>LBSU Water Polo learned this on Saturday against the top-ranked USC Trojans, with key mental mistakes down the stretch giving the vaunted attack from USC all the breathing room they needed to pull away 12-6. <\/span><\/p>\n

Throughout the game, USC used their size and power to push the 49er attack towards the outside, forcing many possession to end with a last second shot. Long Beach Wilson High grad and US Olympian Matt Sagehorn was active in the middle, opening lanes on the wings for Trojan shot.  <\/span>The Trojans jumped out to an early lead, closing the first period up 2-0, and looking every bit like the number one team in the nation (USC hasn’t lost a game and is 18-0 after the win).  <\/span>In the second, Long Beach goalie Derek Wiebe-Bailey really stepped up his play, blocking a bunny shot over his head and sealing the side posts when USC tried to drive with an angle.  <\/span>It was more of the same, in the third, with USC looking bigger and stronger, but a few key exclusion penalties and great scrappy play from Long Beach keeping them in the contest, especially from Keith vanHaaster, the 6’3″ senior center who’s the team’s third-leading scorer on the season.  <\/span>The 49ers’ leading scorer, Jeff Greenwood, was held scoreless.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Despite USC’s offensive power, the 49ers countered effectively, playing well when they were shorthanded and capitalizing on opportunities when they were a man up.  <\/span>Going into the fourth period, they were only down 7-4, and a huge upset seemed within reach.  <\/span>Then almost immediately, the 49ers struck again forty-five seconds into the fourth, pulling them within two.<\/span><\/p>\n

That’s when things got weird.  <\/span>vanHaaster, by far the 49ers’ most effective offensive player in the game, apparently decided the Trojans’ Sagehorn was getting a little too chippy, probably in retaliation for an earlier shot that was decidedly below the Speedo line.  <\/span>vanHaaster, furious, put all of his 245 pounds behind a staggering blow to the back of Sagehorn’s head, eliciting an ejection for the “brutality” call.  <\/span>Yes, brutality is a penalty in water polo.  <\/span>Sagehorn took a penalty shot, but Wiebe-Bailey made a great play in net to knock it down.  <\/span>Despite losing vanHaaster, momentum was still on the ‘Niners’ side, down only two against the rattled Trojans.<\/span><\/p>\n

Then LBSU made a mistake they couldn’t recover from, giving USC a penalty shot opportunity on an illegal substitution call.  <\/span>USC coach Jovan Vavic let Sagehorn take the shot, and this time he netted it, giving USC an 8-5 lead; they then went on a 3-0 run to put the game out of reach, en route to the 12-7 victory.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Those mistakes were momentum shifters,” said Long Beach head coach Gavin Arroyo.  <\/span>“We played three good quarters, but you can’t give a team like them a chance to throw off your momentum.”<\/span><\/p>\n



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Wilson grad Matt Sagehorn hassles the home team<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n



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<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We gave them a run for their money, but on Saturday the No. 1 USC Trojans’ water polo team was too much for the LBSU 49ers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-5454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5454"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5454\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5454"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=5454"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=5454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}