Fryer: Fire's impact felt differently around O.C.

Last week’s fires and resulting poor air quality created plenty of schedule changes. The conditions also produced plenty of confusion about who would play and who would not - and even who could play and who could not.

The Foothill and Newport Harbor water polo teams were among the Orange County teams scheduled to play in the Bellarmine/Lynbrook Finis Memorial Cup Invitational in San Jose this past weekend. There had been a recommendation from the Orange County Department of Education that all athletic events be canceled or postponed for county school teams, and the county’s public school districts followed suit. Private and parochial schools are not under OCDE jurisdiction, so they acted independently.

The Newport-Mesa Unified School District interpreted the OCDE recommendation to mean no county school teams could play anywhere last week. Some others’ interpretation was that the recommendation just had to do with teams playing locally.

So Newport Harbor did not go to San Jose even though the Sailors were seeded No. 2. Coronado of San Diego, seeded No. 1, also did not go.

Foothill did go, and finished fourth.

With CIF-Southern Section playoffs starting next week, playing in that tournament, against very good competition, perhaps helped Foothill prepare for those playoffs. Newport Harbor, meanwhile, could not even practice in our local conditions.

Foothill coach Jim Brumm recognized that his team perhaps was able to stay sharp while others lost their edge.

“Missing a week does have an effect,” he said. “For our kids, they were just excited about the chance to play water polo again. Traveling to a tournament like that can be such a neat thing, with the bonding going on between all the kids, and the teams that didn’t go missed out on that.”

Newport Harbor coach Jason Lynch is concerned about the Sailors’ inactivity.

“We were out of water basically for the entire week,” Lynch said. “You can lose your physical conditioning.”

The Sailors will have a chance to make up for that this week. They played Tuesday night against Los Alamitos in a match that determined the Sunset League championship. Then they play Marina in another league match Thursday, play at La Jolla against The Bishop’s School on Friday, and then play two games, including one against Northwood, on Saturday in the rescheduled Hank Vellekamp Tournament.

“We have a chance to catch up,” Lynch said. “Luckily, the playoffs don’t start until late next week.”

Water polo seedings and first-round pairings will be released Sunday. Wild-card round games will be played Monday and Tuesday. First-round games are Nov. 8 in Division VI and No. 9 in Divisions I-V, when top teams like Foothill and Newport Harbor will begin playoff competition.

Taking a look around Orange County high school sports:

•Water polo championship matches are Nov. 17 at the William Woollett Jr. Aquatics Complex in Irvine. For years the CIF-SS polo finals had been played at dark, noisy Belmont Plaza in Long Beach. “As a traditionalist,” Brumm said, “I liked Belmont, but Woollett is a better facility.”

•First-round parings and seedings also will be released Sunday in girls volleyball. Girls team tennis seedings and first-round pairings will be released Monday. On those days, go to ocvarsity.com, where playoff information will posted as soon as it is available.

•Cross country prelims: Nov. 10 at Mt. San Antonio College in Walnut. Finals: Nov. 17 at Mt. SAC.

•Girls tennis individual action starts with prelims on Nov. 16 at various sites. The semifinals and finals are Nov. 30 at Seal Beach Tennis Center.

•Girls golf team regionals were played Tuesday. The individual regionals are Thursday, with the WSCGA Foundation Tournament, which is the individual championship round, Nov. 12.

•The fires/air quality really made it a scramble in girls golf, when it came to identifying leagues’ CIF-SS qualifiers. In the Sunset League, for example, a 9-hole round was played Tuesday of last week, but the 18-hole round scheduled the following day was canceled, so the 9-hole results dictated the league’s representatives. Sunset League champion Marina had three golfers advance: Ashley Greer, a sophomore, who shot a low-score 36; and senior Jade Okamoto and freshman Halle Young, who both shot 37.

Contact the writer: sfryer@ocregister.com