Marauders lose nailbiter to Trailblazers
The game came down to the final seconds with Monache High School’s boys water polo team holding off a long, strong Golden West team with the score tied at 14.
The game came down to the final seconds with Monache High School’s boys water polo team holding off a long, strong Golden West team with the score tied at 14.
After a clutch block from Marauder goalkeeper Brock Fleischman, the Trailblazers’ Jesus Niederreiter punched in the game-winning shot with 38 seconds left on the clock for the 15-14 win at Monache on Tuesday. Niederreiter finished with a team-high five goals and tied Monache’s Nick Taylor for most goals in the game.
Behind Taylor’s five goals, Xavier Palacios and Garret Keller finished with three goals while Oliver Camarena had two and Jack-thomas Lee had one.
Playing with just eight players due to sickness and injuries, the Marauders (1-2) fought hard throughout the non-league game but ultimately fell short at the end of the every quarter.
“We only had one sub the whole game,” said MHS head coach Evan Thomas. “And for that, playing against a good team. Golden West is really good. They have some strong guys. I thought we did really well to keep it a one goal game.”
Although the game was close from start to finish, the second half was the Marauders closest one. Coming into the second half, Monache (1-2) was down 7-6 after a Garrett Keller goal on a man-up situation with 30-seconds left in the second quarter cut Golden West lead to one.
The Trailblazers scored less than a minute into the third quarter before Keller answered with another goal less than a minute later. Golden West scored their ninth goal of the game 20 seconds later to take the final 2-point lead of the game.
After that score the Marauder continued to attack and answer every Trailblazer goal with one of their own. They closed out the third quarter down 11-10 after Golden West’s Brandon Green scored with five seconds left on a man-up situation.
In the fourth quarter, it was Monache who scored first thanks to another goal from Taylor. Golden West answered quickly to regain the one-point lead and from there on, both teams scored one after another with the Marauders score tying the game and the Trailblazers score given them the lead.
“We had Nick doing some things that he doesn’t usually do, that he was successful with,” said Thomas. “Xavier had to step up because we’re missing some subs and stuff. And then [Camarena], at the end he was doing really well. Being a big person that they had to worry about.”
Defensively Golden West was tough to stop because they were bigger than Monache’s players and the Marauders were down a few players, said Thomas.
“Usually we have enough energy and enough subs to help on defense,” said Thomas. “I think tonight we were a little tired. At the end of the game, it was the second half, they scored instead of seven, they scored eight. I think we were scared to put our all into our defense because we didn’t have a lot of subs.”
Monache got on the board first with a goal from Lee and then another one from Palacios a minute later for the 2-0 lead.
Golden West scored three goals straight in
the span of three minutes to regain the lead before both teams scored a goal to end the first quarter with the Trailblazers leading 7-6.
Camarena scored for the Marauders on a man-up situation and a holding call on Golden West allowed Taylor to tie the game at 5-all in the second quarter. The Trailblazer scored twice more but a Keller goal on another man-up situation kept the score close at 7-6 to end the first half.
“These are good,” said Thomas about the close game. “They help us get ready for important games. These are still preseason [games], just working on stuff. We want to win the games later on in the season that matter a little bit more.”