Fourth quarter surge sinks Acorns
A Central Coast Section playoff game was won. A league championship was captured. And, expectations were exceeded.
But the Cinderella story came to an end this week for the Live Oak High boys water polo team.
On Wednesday, the No. 6-seeded Acorns fell to No. 2 Leland 10-7 in the CCS Division I semifinals at Independence High in San Jose.
“They played their hearts out,” Live Oak Coach Mack Haines said. “I don’t have anything but praise
for the effort that our kids had.”
After finishing second in the Tri-County Athletic League and missing the CCS postseason last season, Live Oak (which finished 23-11 overall) came back with vengeance this season, finishing undefeated in the T-CAL and taking the league title before knocking off a favored No. 3 Gunn team in the quarterfinals of the CCS playoffs last weekend.
Like Gunn, Leland (25-7 overall) had defeated the Acorns twice this season in non-league play.
This time Live Oak couldn’t pull off the upset.
But the Acorns didn’t go down without a fight.
At one point early in the fourth period, the Acorns were actually able to tie the game at 6-6 against a bigger and more experienced Chargers team on junior Corey Robinson’s second of his team-high two goals.
And they did it without T-CAL MVP, junior Ryan Gautchi — who fouled out in the second period.
Even though Live Oak kept the game close until the final five minutes of the contest, Haines said the team’s fate was all but
sealed when Gautchi fouled out, having scored just a single goal.
“Ryan made some mistakes on defense,” Haines said. “That was devastating.”
Gautchi said he had a lot of adrenaline and just let it get the best of him while playing defense.
“I just got too pumped up,” Gautchi said. “I need to learn how to control (myself).”
During the season, Gautchi accounted for 80 percent of Live Oak’s team’s offense, scoring about 180 goals.
Had he not fouled out, Haines said his team would have had a realistic chance of winning.
“It probably would have been different,” Haines said. “(But) you can never tell.”
After Robinson’s game-tying goal, just when it appeared the Acorns would be able to keep the game close and possibly win against favored Leland, the momentum turned the other way.
The Chargers won going away behind senior Michael Walters, who finished with a game-high five goals. Walters single-handedly sunk Live Oak’s ship, scoring four of his five goals in the last five minutes of the game to break a the tie and send Leland on to the CCS Division I champ-ionship match on Saturday against No. 1 Bellarmine.
Despite coming up short, the Acorns were anything but disappointed.
“We all played a great game,” sophomore Bryson Bailey said. “We’re all real proud of how we played.”
Haines said his team gave a valiant effort and couldn’t be more happier with how they played.
“I’m as proud of losing this game as I ever have been of winning a game,” he said. “We played most of the game without
Ryan and the kids responded real well.”
And, with the way his team gave Leland — comprised of almost exclusively seniors — a run for its money, Haines said his team should be better next season, especially after gaining invaluable CCS experience.
Haines said sophomores Justin Short and Shea Coleman played great against Leland.
“(They) really stepped up big in the game,” Haines said. “They really held their own in a CCS-caliber game. This is real high to kind of end the season on … I’ve been talking about retirement for a long time, but I’m charged up for next year.”
