Harvard-Westlake Gets Past El Toro

North Hollywood Harvard-Westlake High overcame a two-goal deficit with five minutes remaining before defeating Lake Forest El Toro, 11-10, in overtime in a Southern Section Division I semifinal boys’ water polo game Wednesday at the Los Alamitos Armed Forces Center.

The third-seeded Wolverines advance to play top-seeded Long Beach Wilson in the championship game Saturday night at Belmont Plaza in Long Beach.

Harvard-Westlake’s Eddie Berman scored the only goal of overtime. The Wolverines (18-4) were awarded back-to-back man-advantage situations and Berman scored on the second.

“We had the team chemistry to pull us through,” said junior Marty Matthies, who scored four goals to lead Harvard-Westlake, including two in the last four minutes of the fourth quarter.

El Toro (23-9) held the Wolverines scoreless in the opening quarter and took a 3-0 lead early in the second on a breakaway goal by Brent Danna. The second-seeded Chargers maintained a three-goal edge at halftime, but Harvard-Westlake scored on its first four possessions in the second half to take a 7-6 lead.

The Chargers answered with three goals on their first three possessions of the fourth quarter and led, 10-8, with 5:03 remaining. Matthies cut the lead to one 12 seconds later, then tied the score after taking a kickout from Juan Delgadillo with 2:51 remaining.

In other playoff games:

Long Beach Wilson 9, San Clemente 8--Thomas Hale scored four goals for Wilson (22-7), which has won the Division I title four of the last five years.