Padres Into CCS Water Polo Final

by Nathan Mollat, Daily Journal Staff

PALO ALTO — Name the sport and Serra has probably won a Central Coast Section championship.

But not in water polo. It's been 30 years since the Padres even made a CCS final in the sport, but Saturday, they'll get their shot at adding a water polo banner to the gym rafters.

The second-seeded Padres took on No. 6 Gunn in the Titans' home pool Wednesday night in a Division I semifinal match and after a tight first half, pulled away in the second on their way to a 17-8 win.

Serra (18-11) will take on top-seeded Los Altos for the CCS Division I championship at Sacred Heart Prep Saturday at a time to be determined.

Los Altos buried fourth-seeded Sequoia, 15-7, in the other semifinal.

"I knew coming into this game that Gunn would be a different team than when we played them earlier," said Serra head coach Tim Kates, referring to a 17-3 win over Gunn (13-14) back in September.

That was certainly the case through the first two quarters as the teams went back and forth. There were four ties and three lead changes in the first quarter alone and the teams were tied at 6-all before a power-play goal from Serra's Reed Hagmuller gave the Padres a 7-6 lead with under a minute left in the first half.

In the second half, however, the Padres clamped down defensively and were even more efficient on offense as they pulled away. They outscored Gunn 10-2 over the final two quarters to punch their ticket to only their third CCS finals appearance in 50 years of CCS play.

I don't think they got as many shots (in the second half). I think we did a better job (defensively)," Kates said. "Their No. 7 (Julian Nagayama) surprised us with some early goals. Our guys said, 'Don't let him shoot.' It was good they recognized that."

While the Serra defense was shutting Gunn down, the Padres' offense was firing on all cylinders and they had a lot of cylinders from which to fire. Hagmuller led the way with a game-high five goals and also added an assist. Dante Tarantino had a hand in seven goals with four goals and three assists. Blake Hagmuller, Sean Coffin and Colin Wright each scored twice for the Padres who had seven players score and 11 players pick up a point — including assists from goalies Gabe Hillard and Rhys Salma.

"We do have two leading guys (Coffin and Wright), but when we're playing well, [offense] comes from everywhere," Kates said. "There are a bunch of guys who can score. We have depth."

Reed Hagmuller put Serra on the board first less than 30 seconds into the match, but Gunn responded about 15 seconds later and took a 2-1 lead at the 4:56 mark of the first quarter.

The Padres tied it when Wright received a pass in the set, bulled his way through a Gunn double team and beat the goalie, but the Titans came right back to regain the lead.

A Coffin 5-meter penalty conversion tied it again, at 3-all, and Wright scored his second goal of the period on a power play for a 4-3 lead, but Gunn's Nagayama lobbed the Serra goalie from the left wing to tie it at 4-all after one period of play.

It was more of the same in the second period as the Padres started to make their presence felt on the power play. They had six man-advantages in the first half and converted half of them, with Reed Hagmuller scoring from the point to put the Padres up 7-6 at halftime.

In the second half, Serra overwhelmed Gunn. Tarantino was nearly unstoppable as he scored three of his four goals in the third quarter as the Padres scored four unanswered goals to take a 10-6 lead midway through the period.

When Tarantino lobbed the Gunn goalie with under a minute left in the third, it put the Padres up 13-7.

Reed Hagmuller scored his fifth goal from the hole set, taking a pass from Wright and holding off a double team to find the back of the net as the Padres outscored the Titans 4-1 in the fourth to round out the scoring.

"They've done such a great job of being consistent throughout the season," Kates said of his squad.