Girls Soccer No. 6 in final poll, to face Saugus on Saturday
The Los Al Girls soccer team will face Saugus in Saturday’s first-round match of the CIF Division I Girls Soccer playoffs. The Griffins, the Surf League champs and owners of a 15-4-5 record, will host the match, which will probably take place at 5pm.
Saugus finished third in the Foothill League with a 10-4-3 record.
A late-season 2-1 loss to Huntington Beach last week cost Los Al a top- 4 seed and knocked them down to No. 6 in the final polls. But the demotion could provide Los Al with some sweet revenge.
If form holds, the Griffins would next face Long Beach Millikan in the second round. The Rams finished second in the Moore League with an 18-3-2 record, and one of those wins was a 2-1 season-opening win over Los Al back in November. Sweet revenge in the form of a win would put the Griffins on a possible quarter-final collision course with No. 3 Harvard-Westlake.
The top four seeds are Santiago, Temecula Valley, Harvard Westlake and Villa Park. The Griffins tied Santiago in the Best in the West tourney, and then fell 2-1 to Temecula Valley in the tourney’s championship match.
Boys Soccer to face San Clemente
The Los Al Boys Soccer team will open their CIF Division I soccer playoff by hosting San Clemente on Friday night at Los Al.
The Griffin Boys, were the Surf League champions with a 10-6-2 overall record while San Clemente finished second in the South Coast League with a 10-3-3 overall mark.
If Los Al were to win, it would play the winner of the Huntoington Beach-Millikan contest. Huntington Beach (14-2-6) is the No. 4 seed. The top three seeds were No. 1 Servite (16-2-2), No. 2 Mira Costa (12-1-4), and No. 3 Santa Ana Valley (21-4-2). Los Al downed Mira Costa 3-1 but fell to Santa Ana Valley 3-1 and Huntington Beach 1-0.
Los Al seeded No. 4 in Girls Water Polo Open Division
The Los Al Girls water polo team made it into the 8-team Open Division in the CIF playoff brackets, now they only have to win against the best teams in Southern California.
The No. 4 seed Griffins will play their first match on Thursday, hosting Foothill. The Griffins bring a 20-6 mark into the match. Foothill is 15-10, with one of those losses being a 13-9 setback to Los Al on December 7.
Los Al finished third in the Surf League, but the two teams ahead of it are No. 1 ranked Newport Harbor and No. 2 Laguna Beach. A Los Al win over Foothill on Thursday sets up a possible semi-final match on Wednesday, Feb. 16, against Newport and a chance for the Griffins to get some revenge for an 8-6 loss to the Sailors on Feb. 2. But Newport will have to defeat Santa Margarita in their opening-round match.
