Mt. San Antonio Pulls Out Thriller For SCC Men's Water Polo Crown

Mt. San Antonio College used a last-minute goal in the finals to capture the South Coast Conference men's water polo championship at the SCC Tournament held Nov. 2 and 4 at Long Beach City College. The Mounties won their second title in the sport and first in 20 years. 

Mt. SAC's Alex Lopez broke a tie with the game-winning goal with 56 seconds left in regulation in a 15-14 finals win over Cerritos, the SCC dual round champs. 

The Mounties also ended Long Beach's streak of five consecutive conference championships as they take a 22-7 record into the Southern California Regional Championships as the #4 seed. Cerritos (21-9) is the #5 seed while Long Beach (12-15) is at #7. 

In 2009, the Mounties won the SCC tournament, but with points combined for both dual and conference tourney deciding the champion back then, Long Beach won the overall title that year.

In the title game, Joshua Lamberton had tied for Cerritos at 14-14 with 1:17 left before Lopez played hero. Overall, Brandon Fabrega scored a game-high five goals with two assists to lead Mt. SAC while Silvestre Chavez and Timothy Robles each scored the hat trick for the Falcons. Edward (EJ) Lynch added three goals for the Mounties.

Cerritos led 13-11 during the fourth quarter before Mt. SAC scored the next three goals.

THIRD PLACE FINAL: Long Beach 15, El Camino 5. The Vikings saw a 23-game, SCC winning streak stopped in the dual season in a 13-11 loss to Mt. SAC, and had to settle for third at this year's tourney. LBCC has been led this season by Michael Minera, who had 61 goals in the regular season. 

In the semifinals, Lopez, the state's leading scorer with 143, and Roman Robles scored the final two goals in a 14-12 Mt. SAC win over Long Beach. Lopez finished with three goals as did George Roby-Unkovich. For the Vikings, Colley Ochoa fired in five goals.

Lamberton scored five goals in Cerritos' semifinals triumph over El Camino, 19-10. For the Warriors, Scott Fujiwara tallied two goals, three assists and game highs on defense with eight steals and five field blocks. 

Fourth-Place El Camino won 11-7 over Chaffey in a first round game that placed Chaffey fifth overall. Marc Bugarin scored four goals and Sam Adams made 10 saves for ECC while Parker Black had four goals and Elijah Bell had 15 saves for the Panthers.