|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Brian Kreutzkamp reached into his motivation bag and pulled out an extra weapon before his Sacred Heart Prep boys’ water polo team hosted Bellarmine this week.
“I pulled out the all-time WCAL record book (for boys’ water polo),” Kreutzkamp said. “I think there was only a couple of times that Bellarmine wasn’t listed. They’ve been the champions for a long time.”
Kreutzkamp wanted to make sure his players knew that Sacred Heart Prep had never beaten the Bells during the regular season.
“I reminded them of that,” Kreutzkamp said.
The Gators must have listened because they went out Tuesday and quieted the Bells with an 11-8 victory in a West Catholic Athletic League showdown in Atherton.
“It’s our first regular-season win ever over Bellarmine,” Kreutzkamp said. “And, it’s only the second time we’ve ever beaten them.”
The first time came last season, when the Gators upset the Bells in the WCAL playoff finale to share the overall league crown. Since 1991, the first year such records are listed in the WCAL record book, the Bells have shared the crown only three times and lost the outright title just once <0x2014> in 1997 to Leland.
Bellarmine, the defending CCS Division I champion, lost its venerable coach (Larry Rogers) to a sabbatical leave and a handful of top players to graduation. Then again, everything is relative when it comes to comparisons. When Sacred Heart Prep won its first and only CCS (Division (II) title in 2003, the Gators lost to Bellarmine in both meetings.
“Regardless of who’s the coach and who they’ve lost to earlier, they’re still Bellarmine,” Kreutzkamp reminded. “There’s always an aura and mystique about Bellarmine, in swimming and water polo. What I tried to get across to our athletes when I got here was that they (the Bells) could be beaten. A lot of it becomes mental the longer it goes.”
On Tuesday, the Sacred Heart Prep junior varsity got the day started by beating Bellarmine for the first time ever, setting the table for the varsity’s equally triumph.
“I was just so happy to see our program clear that big hurdle,” Kreutzkamp said.
Surprisingly, the Gators (2-0, 11-1) took the victory in stride. One reason may have been that St. Francis already had beaten the Bells, who now are a very uncharacteristic 4-7 overall and virtually out of the race for the regular-season championship. The other reason was SHP’s weary weekend at the Villa Park Tournament in Southern California.
“We were really fatigued after last weekend,” said Kreutzkamp, whose team went 4-1 and finished second after losing to top seed El Toro, 12-11 in overtime. “We had only two days to get ready for Bellarmine.”
The tiredness showed up in the second half, after the Gators’ charged to a 5-1 lead behind a pair of goals by Tim Norton and one each by Paul Rudolph, Andrew Child and Kevin Meisel. Norton (five goals) and Rudolph (three) pushed the lead to 8-2 in the third quarter. When Bellarmine’s top player, Pat Talbot, picked up his third ejection and took a permanent seat on the bench early in the fourth quarter, Kreutzkamp said his team just went on cruise control.
“I think our guys really slowed after that,” Kreutzkamp said. “They just wanted to get out of the pool with a win.”
Despite giving up eight goals, the Gators’ defense was particularly good in shutting down the Bells early while allowing the SHP offense to build a comfortable lead. Senior goalie Michael Wishart came up with 10 saves to help spark the defensive effort.
Talbot actually picked up two fouls in the opening quarter and had to sit out, opening the door for the Gators’ big first half. Then again, Sacred Heart Prep showed once again why it has been ranked No. 1 in the CCS all season.
That ranking, however, will be put to the test on Oct. 24 when the Gators visit currently undefeated St. Francis in a showdown for the league crown. A few days before that, Sacred Heart will host some of the top teams in the state in the North/South Challenge at the SHP and Menlo-Atherton pools.
Menlo and Menlo-Atherton both are entered and rightfully so. The Knights (4-0, 10-3) and Bears (2-1, 10-5) are the class of the PAL Bay Division and highly ranked in the CCS — Menlo at No. 3 and M-A at No. 6.
Menlo swamped host Burlingame on Wednesday, 12-2, as James Balassone scored three goals and goalie Scott Platshon had 13 saves and three assists while triggering coach Jack Bowen’s “new and improved” counter attack. Alex Avery, Toby Espinosa and Gerrard Clark all benefited with two goals apiece.
Menlo-Atherton took a break from league play to post a 15-7 nonleague win over visiting Soquel, the same team the Bears beat last weekend (17-10) in the St. Francis Invitational. Seniors Matt Bogott and Kevin Lane split eight goals to pace the Bears.
Palo Alto, ranked fourth in the CCS, remained atop the SCVAL De Anza Division standings at 3-0 (11-4 overall) with a not-so-pretty 11-7 win at rival Gunn on Wednesday.
“It was an ugly game, but we pulled it out,” said Paly coach Reid Particelli.
Paly junior Tim Wenzlau dominated play with six goals and two steals. Gunn senior Michael Cooke tallied four goals for the Titans (1-3, 1-13).
Earlier in the week, Palo Alto held off visiting Los Altos, 5-4, in a showdown for first place. It was the second time in three days that Paly had beaten Los Altos.
In the first meeting, the Vikings held off the Eagles in sudden death overtime, 9-8, in the semifinals of the St. Francis Invitational. Paly senior Geng Wang scored the winning goal in that match.
On Monday, Wang once again threw in the winning goal with just under a minute to play. Senior goalie Will Simon had 15 blocks while Wang tallied three goals.
Palo Alto will host its annual invitational this Friday and Saturday, but the Vikings will not be playing. After their second-place finish in the Schmitt Invitational to open the season, the Vikings received an invitation to the TruWest Invitational (Oct. 26-27) that brings together the top teams from Northern and Southern California. In order to compete in that event, Paly had to change some plans.
“As the confirmations (for the Paly tourney) already went out, we had to pull out of our own tournament but not mess up all the other teams already signed up,” said Particelli. “It’s not completely unprecedented; it has been done before. But it has been years since an invitation to TruWest has forced us out of our own tourney.”
The Palo Alto Invitational will open Friday at Paly with Gunn taking on Live Oak at 1 p.m. The top team entered is Long Beach Miliken. The championship game will be Saturday at 6 p.m.
Cross country
Andy Del Calvo finished sixth in 16:51 and Jeff Hester took 12th in 17:06 to help Menlo-Atherton finish third in the PAL No. 2 meet on Tuesday over the 2.95-mile Crystal Springs’ layout in Belmont.
Gunn finished sixth at the Ram Invitational last Saturday at Westmoor High. Jonathan Popovich led the Titans with a 20th-place clocking of 13:30 over the hilly 2.4-mile course.
Soccer
Sacred Heart Prep tuned up for Friday’s showdown with first-place King’s Academy in Atherton (3:30 p.m.) with a 4-2 victory over visiting Pinwood on Wednesday in Private Schools Athletic League action.
The Gators (7-1, 9-3) got two goals from Riley Fallon while the Panthers fell to 1-8 in league (1-9 overall).
The news for Pinewood wasn’t any better a day earlier when host Woodside Priory handed the Panthers a 6-2 loss. Freshman Brandon Willhite scored three goals for Priory and Brian Hong added two, while Servando Barriga contributed two assists for the third-place Priory.
“The boys played good possession-oriented soccer, building from the back and creating many scoring opportunities,” said Priory coach Armando Del Rio.
Redwood City attorney sues ‘First Amendment auditors’ after Menlo Park disputeApril 2, 2026 11:31 am
