Local water polo team captures Winterfest tourney

The Huntington Beach Water Polo Club 12-and-Under boys’ team won its division Sunday at the Winterfest Tournament at Northwood High.

Huntington played four games on a Saturday schedule that began at 7:30 a.m. The team defeated Laguna Beach (10-5), Corona del Mar (11-4), Commerce and Rose Bowl, the latter in a game where Huntington came back from a 4-0 first-quarter deficit to earn a 9-8 win. On Sunday, Huntington defeated host Northwood, 8-5, in the title game.

Twelve teams competed for the division title. This year marks the first time that the Huntington Beach boys’ 12U team has won the tournament. It’s previous-best showing was an 11th-place finish, Coach Sasa Branisavljevic said.

The 12U team has will play in the OC Cup and Mikasa Cup tournaments in the coming months, leading up to the Junior Olympic Qualifiers in May. The team’s goal is to qualify to play in the USA Water Polo Junior Olympics in July.

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Swimming

The Southern California Swimming Older Junior Olympic Championships ended Sunday with West Coast Swimming, a team of elite swimmers from Golden West Swim Club in Huntington Beach, finishing in 13th place among 39 club teams.

Shelby Webber and Kelsey Cummings placed first in their individual events and helped West Coast Swimming win the 400-yard freestyle relay on the fourth and final day of the event. Webber won the 100 free in 51.23 seconds. Cummings had the best time of the meet and defeated her closest competition in the mile by 12 seconds with a swim of 16:39.25

In the girls’ 400 free relay, the WCS ‘A’ team of Dari Watkins (53.45), Alli Gillespie (52.49), Kelsey Cummings (52.14), and Shelby Webber (51.58) won the event in 3:29.66

— Submitted by Laura Wright

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Girls’ Soccer

The Wildthings, a girls’ Under-10 from AYSO Region 55, won its division Sunday at the AYSO Section 11 tournament in Garden Grove.

The Wildthings (19-2) will compete against three other Section championship teams at the AYSO Sate Championships tournament, beginning March 12 in Garden Grove. The winner of the tournament advances to compete at the upcoming AYSO National Championships in Michigan.

The team took first-place in Region 55 and won the Area K tournament before winning last weekend’s Section 11 tournament.