South Florida Water Polo CLub, 2025 Osuna Memorial Tournament Round-Up
On July 6th and 7th, South Florida Water Polo Club travelled to Tamiami with four contingents to compete at the newly sanctioned Lucas Osuna Memorial Tournament hosted by Miami Whitecaps at Belen Jesuit Prep School. The tournament was sanctioned about a month ago after the unfortunate passing of Lucas Osuna, a water polo player from Belen Jesuit that had suddenly passed away during the high school season due to unforeseen heart complications, in his memory, his home club hosted a memorial tournament to commemorate the brilliant young man for the impact he had on the many lives around him in the tight-knit water polo community of South Florida.
South Florida attended the tournament bringing a team to compete in every division; 12u, 14u, 18u and open mixed divisions. Our young, up and coming 12u team finished the weekend with a 2-2 record that was good for a second-place finish in the tournament, the 14u team finished the tournament with a record of one win and three losses, the 18u contingent came to the same final record as the 14u finishing the tournament on the last game of the day with a win and three losses. The Open Mixed squad managed to bring home the gold medal by topping the five-team division and posting a record of four wins and no losses to close the tournament.
The 12u finished the first day of the tournament with one win and one loss, this put them in a three-way tie with the two Whitecaps teams that registered for the tournament after beating one and losing to the other. On the second day, the South Florida peanuts came up clutch in the first game, serving a huge third quarter comeback to beat Gladiators Water Polo and securing a spot in the championship game. The championship game proved to be a goal-fest, falling just short by a score of 24-23, most importantly everyone had fun and lots of smiles were had in the scorching Miami heat.
The 14u team started similar to the 12u contingent, with a one win and one loss record after the first day of play, the team found itself in a crossover semifinal match up against the Miami Whitecaps 14u team. The second day of competition proved unfruitful for our 14u team as they had lost the two games to finish the tournament in fourth place but with a lot of hope and potential for what is to come down the pipeline for the group.
The 18u team started the tournament with two losses, somewhat undermanned with several stronger players missing the games due to academic obligations or travels to college for decisions on future education, South Florida still put out a capable team that lost close games. On the second day, the 18u team managed to take a surprising victory over the eventual winners of the tournament Miami Riptides by a score of 12-11 but later fell in the last game of the tournament, finishing the tournament with a 1-3 record, the tournament was a good opportunity to some of our newer 18u athletes to get some much needed playing time in an official competitive setting.
The Open Mixed team showed their experience and togetherness, even while missing some of the club’s stronger players the South Florida elders were still able to bring home the gold medal, first with a win over Whitecaps Alumni, though the team did not play great it proved capable of self-reflection in preparations for the next games, the second game of the night was against the Whitecaps Masters team, a physical and aggressive game did not deter our South Florida squad, leading most of the way with some timely goals from players of the squad like Nikola Gogic, Enrique Antezana, Eric Goldenberg and Vedran Sosa, even when the Miami-based masters team would claw at the lead, our poised Masters team was able to maintain the lead with timely defensive stops and great instances of team play with a great showing in the goal by shot-stopper, Joey Maxson. The second day of competition was just as successful with a big victory for a more depleted South Florida squad as they opened the day with a 11-6 win over Gladiators which put them in a 3-0 record showdown against Miami Riptides’ mixed open team to win the division. With Gregory Nordheim, Samuel Eastaugh and Jimmy Ferraz all drawing specific assignments against some of Riptides’ top players our South Florida team was able to jump to a 8-3 halftime lead, however, the second half would prove to be a defensive battle and in the end a 10-9 victory sealed the deal championing South Florida Water Polo Club’s Open Mixed team as the first champions of the Osuna Memorial Tournament’s open mixed division.
We also want to congratulate our very own Gregory Nordheim, not only for playing with the Open Mixed team, but also for coaching his very first competitive games of water polo with our 12u and 14u teams.
