Centennial overcomes Ayala, on to to D-5 final

CHINO HILLS » The Centennial girls water polo team is so good, it seems like the Huskies can name their score against their CIF Southern Section playoff opponents.

That’s not exactly true, coach Crystal Voss said.

But the Huskies did little to quash that perception Wednesday.

Top-seeded Centennial routed its fourth straight playoff opponent, defeating fourth-seeded Ayala 25-9 in a Division 5 semifinal match. Centennial advances to the finals for the first time since 2005, and will face No. 2 seed Jserra at the Woollett Aquatics Center in Irvine on Saturday at 10:50 a.m.

Centennial had won its first three playoff games by identical 22-6 scores. The Huskies didn’t repeat that score Wednesday but still won by the same margin of 16 goals. Ayala meanwhile, won its three playoff games before Wednesday by a combined eight goals.

Despite being a heavy favorite, Centennial (24-6) didn’t display any nerves at the outset.

“If we have nerves, we use that to keep pushing,” Voss said.

Centennial got off to a 9-1 lead after a quarter, it grew to 10-1 11 seconds into the second quarter and the Huskies never led by fewer than seven goals the rest of the game. Voss, who is in her second year as head coach and fourth year in the program, used three goalies Wednesday and that was by design. She starts with Kylee Hieda in goal, then moves her to the field if the Huskies have a big enough lead. Since they did, she moved to the field in the second quarter (where she scored a goal) and Brianna Johnson handled goalie duties in the middle two quarters before Clarysa Sirls played the position in the fourth.

Centennial’s offense got clicking early then slowed in the second half when the Huskies took their foot off the gas. Jessie Nelson had 10 goals to lead Centennial, while Bailey Desmond added seven and Alejandra Rico scored four.

Nelson got off to an especially quick start, scoring six goals in the first quarter. In the first half, Centennial consistently kept Nelson in the offensive half of the pool even when the Huskies were on defense, forcing Ayala to keep a defender with her.

“She’s usually doubleteamed, so this is a way we can have only one defender on her,” Voss said.

Said Ayala coach Kevin Hammond: “We knew they had the big girl, No. 19 (Nelson) and a club player, No. 2 (Desmond). We knew they were very good. We also have good teams in our league.”

Centennial finished second to King in the Big VIII League, while Ayala was fifth in the Palomares League.

“I think the biggest positive is that we were better (this season) than we expected,” said Hammond, who loses only three seniors (one of whom is a starter) due to graduation. “And we ended up being top four in the division.”

When Centennial wasn’t on the counterattack, the Huskies’ offensive set had two Ayala defenders battling with Nelson in the two-meter spot. That left Centennial with some clean looks at some shots from distance and the Huskies took advantage.

“That’s something we’ve been working on, our outside shots,” Voss said.

Voss said she had optimism for this year’s team, despite the fact that Centennial finished with a losing record and failed to make the playoffs in the last full season, two years ago.

“I told the girls after last year (an abbreviated season due to the pandemic), that we were going to CIF this year,” she said. “We had some girls who were in the program four years.”

Centennial’s other goal scorers were Ximena Sanchez (two), and Catherine Jenkins (one).

Ayala (17-13) was led by Clare Baty, who scored three goals, while Isabella Cocks added two and Kalanie Parrott, Sabrina Trout and Jamie Bracht and Madelyn Argumosa scored one apiece.