The Cleveland High boys water polo team ended a dynasty last season.
It followed that up with another on Wednesday, beating Eagle Rock 9-4 at Valley College to capture its third straight City Section championship and second straight in the Open Division.
Team captain Jordan Tarlow scored three goals, Charlie Rinsky had two and Artur Petrosian made par on 5-yard shots for the top-seeded Cavaliers, who won the Division I crown in 2023 and last fall ended Palisades' streak of 11 straight titles with a 15-4 victory in the same pool.
“I'm the only one who's been on the team for four years, and I've got a lot of my friends joining me,” said Tarlow, who missed the first month of the season due to illness and was forced to watch his team lose 11 of its first 12 games — five of them by one goal. “I would say it's harder to defend the title because now we know we could lose it. Hopefully we can continue. Wherever I go to college next year, I'll be flying here for the final.”
The top-seeded Cavaliers (13-17) extended their lead to 4-0 on Tarlow's late goal early in the second quarter before he was triple-teamed. Cleveland focused on defense in the second half to squash any hope Eagle Rock had of a comeback.
“Our family has become a lot tighter this year,” Tarlow added. “I made sure we weren't cocky. I held a team dinner at my house. In water polo, the most important thing is team chemistry. We had an insanely talented team our freshman year, but we didn't go anywhere because we all had problems with each other.”
Reed Winters scores one of his two goals for Palisades, which defeated Granada Hills 8-7 in the Division 1 final.
(Steve Galluzzo/For The Times)
Cleveland goalie Allen McWeeney made 11 saves, as did fellow Eagle Rock's Oliver Loeb. Acin Lopez, Caleb Yetter, Zolin Lopez and Pablo Galante each scored a goal for the second-place Eagles.
Rinsky scored the Cavaliers' final goal with 1:25 left to put his team back within five points, and afterward the junior described him and Tarlow — his best friend on the team — as a “dynamic duo.”
“Our coach warned us before the season that all the other teams would come for us,” Rinsky said. “It was tough without Jordan and there were some frustrating times, but as the season went on we started to trust each other more and right before the league started we won a few games which really helped us mentally.”
Despite its recent section dominance, Palisades was not one of the four teams selected for this fall's Open Division bracket and settled for the Division 1 title, holding off Granada Hills 8-7 thanks to a feline effort from goalie Aidan Moriarty, who made 12 saves, including four in one game, to stop a 5-yard attempt in the third quarter.
Hudson Mirzadeh scored five goals, Reed Winters had two and Sean Ellis added one for the third-ranked Dolphins, who have won 18 section titles, including the six straight they won in the 1970s before the sport was discontinued until 2008.
Jason Bowden scored three goals, Sebastian Villagrana added two and Andrew Flores stopped five shots for the top-seeded Highlanders, who trailed 6-3 at halftime.
Villagrana nearly tied the game on Granada Hills' final possession, but his shot from the right wing with eight seconds left went off the crossbar.
