Pali High’s Mitchell Kim talks about finishing third at the Hank Vellekamp Tournament.
The Palisades High boys varsity water polo team prepared for its playoff run by traveling to Servite High in Anaheim on Friday and Saturday to compete in the Hank Vellekamp Tournament.
The Dolphins won their pool with convincing victories over Ocean View (22-3) and Loyola’s JV (17-8) on Friday, before losing to the other two pool winners, Mater Dei’s JV (17-16) and Santa Monica (10-5) on Saturday to finish third out of nine teams.
Santa Monica went 4-0 to take first place and Mater Dei’s JV was the runner-up at 3-1.
Palisades played Santa Monica in an intersectional match in September and lost 17-10.
“Last time we didn’t play much defense against them, they were scoring one after another on us,” Mitchell Kim said of Santa Monica. “Today, it started off the same way but we held them to two goals in the second half. The two games today were rough games but we hung in there.”
Zach Senator had a stellar tournament, racking up six goals, five assists and six steals in three quarters against Loyola, scoring four goals with six assists and four steals against Mater Dei and adding three goals and three steals against Santa Monica.
“We played great yesterday but we were a little lackadaisical today,” said Kian Lotfi, who had five goals and four steals against Mater Dei and added six steals against Samo. “Not having Lucas [Silva] hurt us this last game since he’s one of our best scorers. This was more of a physical challenge than we get in league.”
Palisades’ junior varsity went 1-2, beating Sonora and losing to Huntington Beach and Los Alamitos.
— Steve Galluzzo
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