Vikings Rally For 5th Straight SCC Men's Water Polo Championship, LBCC seeded No. 3 for SoCal Regionals

Long Beach City College refuses to lose when it comes to the sport of water polo. The Vikings rallied from down 6-4 late in the first half and defeated Cerritos, 13-11, in the championship match of the 2022 South Coast Conference Men's Water Polo Tournament held Nov. 3 and 5 at El Camino College.

It was Long Beach's fifth straight conference title and 23rd overall SCC crown going back to 1986.

The physical contest included 33 exclusions, 19 on LBCC, and produced 15 goals with the man advantage (Cerritos with eight power play scores).

The Vikings (19-8 overall) finished 7-0 in conference games and ran their SCC winning streak to 23 games going back to the 2018 season (a 7-6 loss to Cerritos that ended the round robin part of the schedule that year).

Long Beach earned the #3 seed and are the hosts for the Southern California Championships this Nov. 10-12. Cerritos is the #8 seed while SCC third-place Mt. San Antonio the #9 seed.

In the title match, Kobe Hurtado's second of his three goals gave the Falcons a 6-4 advantage with 2:04 left in the second quarter. Michael Minera's second PP goal finally gave Long Beach the lead for good at 8-7 with 4:47 remaining in the third quarter. Minera added his third goal of the period as the Vikings eventually led 10-8 going into the fourth quarter. After the Falcons' Dominic Hernandez scored to cut it to 10-9, Itay Batito netted back-to-back shots that gave LBCC enough distance to win the title. 

Like Minera, Batito finished with a hat trick and Harry Peterson added two goals. For second-place Cerritos (21-13, 5-3), Hernandez tallied three goals, four assists and set a school record by drawing 12 Long Beach ejections. 

By Robert Lewis, South Coast Conference