PREP WATER POLO PLAYOFFS : El Toro Upsets El Dorado on Late Goal

El Toro High School’s Jason Kneitel only played one quarter of water polo Tuesday, but oh, what a quarter it was.

The 6-foot-3 senior scored the winning goal with 49 seconds left to play to lead El Toro to an 11-10 victory over top-seeded El Dorado in a Southern Section Division 4-A semifinal game at El Toro.

El Toro will play Capistrano Valley in a semifinal game Saturday with the site and time to be determined today. The game will be a rematch of last year’s Division 3-A title match that El Toro won, 12-8. It is also a rematch of South Coast League rivals: El Toro was seeded second and Capistrano Valley third.

The score was 4-4 at halftime and 8-8 after three quarters.

Kneitel scored with four minutes 43 seconds left in the fourth quarter to tie the game at 9-9 after he slipped between his man and the goal. J.P. Mathot, who led all scorers with five goals, scored from the left post to give El Toro a 10-9 lead with 3:04 left.

But El Dorado’s Larry Felix tied the score, 10-10, in a six-on-five situation.

El Toro set up its double-post offense with Mathot and and Kneitel at each post, and Kneitel was able to turn El Dorado’s smaller Kyle Utsumi and whip the ball just over goalie Joe Benson’s head with 49 seconds left.

After a timeout, El Dorado (17-5) set up a play to tie the score but Andy McIntyre stole the ball with 35 seconds left and El Toro ran out the clock.

El Dorado got two goals each from Utsumi, Greg Milton and Dolan Mayeda.