Greenwich played great defense and kept pushing in second half. Mission’s shooting was off in the first half. I thought they would recover in second but it never happened. Greenwich deserved the win for the hard work on both sides of the ball especially in the second half.
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Agreed. Come from behind victories are always well earned!
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High school coaches do it sometimes when they win a section title especially if it’s the first time for them.
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As someone mentioned previously, Greenwich played really good defense. They made very few mistakes, didn’t get countered, and played a great zone defense that put their goalie in a position to make saves he was comfortable making. I believe the Greenwich goalie is the best in 12u water polo this year. #9 on Greenwich is also one of the best players in the country this year. I felt Mission was off that game and I believe that they have much better water polo ahead of them.
Such a great tournament, but all these teams have a quick turnaround with Futures this weekend. Lots of great SoCal matchups as per usual, Mission should beat SoCal and Vanguard vs Dons should be a good one. I’m guessing Dons vs Mission for the SoCal Futures championship.
NorCal has CCU playing SJX which could go either way, as well as Stanford matching up with Lamorinda for the first time this season. My guess is Stanford vs CCU for the NorCal Futures championship.
And now the fun begins…
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I’m surprised no one is talking about CDM’s tie against CCU, given how easily they could’ve won based on that performance in their next few games.
Very close with both of them blowing out Commerce, really could have gone either way. Not a fan of this tie breaker format because it promotes running up the scores on the lower seed teams.
The first tie-breaker at SDCC is goals against. Then it goes to goals scored. They don’t use a traditional goal differential tie breaking system.
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Yes I know. So running up the score on Commerce could be necessary to win the tie breaker.
How did Newport end up in the semis? They played Greenwich as tight as Mission but lack size of the other elite 12u teams
Maybe the score reflects the strategy? Do just enough to get to final and conserve for the real fight? Greenwich earned themselves gold. Winning sometimes takes careful measures. Sometimes Winning means conserving till the end, because to finish first you must finish strong.
Newport also has, historically speaking, some special shooting talent at the 12u and 14u age group.
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I didn’t get to see Newport in the Semi game but Stanford was in control of the 3rd place game after half and wore them down in the 4th.
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Mission vs Vanguard for 1st place in Socal Futures. SD Dons got cleaned out by Vanguard who looked very very good. Final will be interesting.
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Stanford vs CCU for Northern CA final.
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Mission undefeated for Div1 12U Futures. Vanguard has made some great improvements but not enough to take down Mission yet.
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Stanford looked great. After starting the game where neither CCU or Stanford was playing defense, and I think the first five possessions resulted in a 3-2 score, Stanford got serious. The lead for Stanford ballooned to 8-3 at half and Stanford was on cruise control after that.
This is the best I’ve seen Stanford play.
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Stanford was missing a player as well today, the tallest and one of the more athletic kids on the team that’s in the 2MD rotation off the bench.
Definitely the best game Stanford has had all year
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It seems like the top 5 might have shuffled some. Vanguard demonstrated significant superiority to SD Dons but could not beat Mission (-#2). Greenwich appears to deserve the #1 spot after besting that same Mission(-#2). Stanford appears to be best of Norcal based on Futures Final and SD Cup Bronze so I think that slots them into the #5 spot. I think it will be interesting as we go through JO quals and the run up to JO’s who maximizes gains and and who goes flat.
I agree with your top-5
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Just cut to the chase and ask Marco for an updated ranking 
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