Montebello High School goalie Ely Bonilla looks to pass during the CIF Southern Section Division III title game against Murrieta Valley. Montebello won, 8-7 in overtime. (Photo by Ron Guild)
Story Published:
Nov 24, 2009 at 12:50 PM PDT
Story Updated:
Nov 24, 2009 at 12:50 PM PDT
Other than their title game experience, Montebello High School boys water polo coach Kenny Clements grasped for explanations about how the Oilers pulled out their latest championship.
As he said following the Oilers’ successful defense of their title with an 8-7 overtime victory over Murrieta Valley in the CIF Southern Section Division III final in Irvine, “After the first two goals, we were outplayed the whole game. It could have gone either way easily.
“We were struggling. Our players were running on empty the whole second half. They were dead-tired at the end of the game. Murrieta was a strong team and we couldn’t do what we wanted to do. They were posing more problems for us than we were for them.
“Maybe it was the fact we had more seniors. I don’t know what else it was, but we did just enough to win.”
The Oilers (28-5) have five seniors who have been in CIF-SS Division III title games all four years in high school, winning in 2006, 2008 and 2009. This is the fifth division title and seventh title game appearance in the last seven years for the program.
Last year, they edged Murrieta Valley, 7-6 in the final.
Maybe experience was the difference.
Senior Jonathan Ruiz scored with 42 seconds left in regulation, forcing overtime, then senior Erik Gonzalez put in the only goal of overtime with 2:10 left in the second 3-minute extra period.
Senior Ely Bonilla, the Oilers’ 6-foot-8 goalie and 2008 Division III player of the year, made enough key saves (six) along the way to keep the top-seeded Nighthawks (28-3) at bay.
Goals by Gonzalez and sophomore Miguel Garcia gave the Oilers a quick 2-0 lead.
But the Nighthawks answered with goals by Cody Weatherbee and Jantz Johnson to tie the score. Garcia’s goal gave the lead briefly back to Montebello, but Murrieta’s Eric Van de Mortel scored with 15 seconds left in the half for a 3-3 tie.
The Nighthawks scored the first goal of the second half, but Garcia quickly got the Oilers even at 4-4.
Montebello did not lead again until overtime.
After scoring on a penalty shot to take a 5-4 lead, the Nighhawks saw it disappear when junior Rafael Romero scored with 5:08 left in the fourth period.
A goal by Weatherbee made it 6-5, but Torres answered with 3:04 left to tie it at 6-6. Each team scored in the final 68 seconds of regulation.
After the Gonzalez’ goal in overtime, Carlos Panfilo blocked a shot with 20 seconds left when the Oilers were a man short. They ran out the rest of the clock.
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