Overtime at the Open

“My favorite part of the game is always the beginning,” said Sy Zahedi. “You have that nervous energy, and then once the ball is thrown in, everything becomes slow motion.”

That calm arrived just in time at the Pacific Coast Open, where Zahedi Chogan staged a roaring comeback to edge Mrs Momma Bear 11–10 in an extra chukka.

Mrs Momma Bear – Hunter Azzaro, Santiago Torres, Harrison Azzaro and Mike Azzaro – had built a formidable 9–4 lead before Zahedi Chogan began clawing back. Sy Zahedi, Juan Curbelo, Facundo Obregon and Nico Escobar finally pulled even at 9–9, setting up a breathless seventh chukka. Harrison put Mrs Momma Bear ahead 10–9, Obregon answered, and Escobar buried the deciding penalty for the win.

“Being nervous and being excited are almost identical,” Zahedi said. “You channel nervousness into being excited. Then they throw the ball and everything comes down. I love that feeling.”

Longtime Carpinteria sculptor John Godkin was appropriately horsing around on the sidelines, holding one of his cast-bronze horses. Godkin created a sculpture you may remember, the life-size bronze stallion installed outside the Cattlemen’s Inn on Upper State Street in 1972. When the business closed, it was given away and lost. John just amazingly refound it through happenstance. It’s now being restored and installed in front of a whiskey distillery in SLO. Cheers to serendipity.

As Zahedi put it, in polo, once play begins: “You hear nothing, see nothing – just the ball right in front of you – what you’re supposed to do.”

Seven chukkas later, the nerves were gone, the zone had arrived – and team Zahedi Chogan had survived overtime at the Open.