 | | | Photos provided | | | | | | This month local water polo club, Diablo Alliance, won a National Championship on the girl's side and brought home the bronze on the boy's side of the prestigious Kap 7 Champions Cup tournament, at Indiana University. This tournament is one of the oldest age group water polo tournaments in our country dating back to its inception in 1993. It is a unique tournament as it is a National Championship for athletes in eighth grade or under. Athletes from Hawaii, Texas, California, Connecticut, Illinois, and Michigan traveled to Indiana to compete against the best eight grade and under teams in our nation.
The Diablo Alliance girl's squad is a tight group of young women who have been playing together for several years. Some of these ladies have been playing together since they were 8 and 9 years old. They have always been a highly competitive group of athletes, but this fall have really come into their own.
After a challenging weekend of high-level play, the girls squad found themselves going into the semifinals. Having suffered only one loss to SoCal (9-6) they matched up with SET in the semis, a team hailing from El Toro, California. The game was a battle, but Diablo was able to secure their spot in the Championship game with an 17-11 win. A couple hours later they hopped back in the tank for a redemption battle with the team handing them their only loss of the tournament, Socal, from Tustin, California. The girls were prepped and ready to go and after an amazing 4 quarters of total team play, they were victorious 11-7.
The boy's squad had a similar path to the medal stand but with a tough loss to Greenwich (18-12) in the semifinals found themselves matched up with SoCal in the third-place match. Like the girl's team, they too had suffered an earlier loss to SoCal in bracket play 13-7 but were ready to put it all on the line to bring home a medal. The boys jumped out to an early lead and never looked back, winning in illustrious fashion 13-6. This is a historic win for this group as it is the first National Tournament where a Diablo Alliance boys' team has taken home a medal. |
Lamorinda Weekly, Moraga CA