UC Santa Barbara Men’s Water Polo Team placed No. 1 in the Big West-WCC Challenge. 15 Completed the Weekend by Beating LMU
No. 13 The UC Santa Barbara Men’s Water Polo Team completed the first Big West-WCC Challenge in Los Angeles with a challenging weekend. In the morning, No. The Gauchos lost to No. 4 Pepperdine by a 13-11 margin in the afternoon. 15 Loyola closed the weekend with a victory, defeating Marymount 16-12.
No. 13 UC Santa Barbara 11, no. 4 Pepperdine 13
After the first match three days ago, the teams faced each other once again and it was a head-to-head match. Here. Special plays decided the fate of the match, with 14 of the 24 total goals coming via either powerplay or penalty kicks.
UC Santa Barbara’s Adam Gyenis started the scoring with a powerplay goal on the first offensive play, but Pepperdine quickly responded in kind. With the goals of Gauchos’ Brock Zamanian and Luke Bachler, the teams were close to each other, and with the goal of Landon Lassahn, the score was tied at 6-6.
Dom Brown scored UCSB’s fifth powerplay goal in the third quarter, making the score 9-8. However, Pepperdine won the game by scoring five consecutive goals. Even though Danilo Dragovic completed the hat-trick, UCSB’s comeback efforts were not enough.
No. 13 UC Santa Barbara 16, no. 15 Loyola Marymount 12
The Gauchos bounced back with an impressive performance against LMU in the afternoon game. With goals scored by Shane Hoover, Zamanian, Gyenis, Bachler and Brown, UCSB closed the first quarter ahead 5-4. website. In the second quarter, the defense and offense were fired up and the difference was widened. While Levi Lentin made important saves in defense, the team blocked nine shots. Gyenis scored three goals in the second quarter alone and UCSB was ahead 11-6 at halftime.
In the second half, the Gauchos maintained their consistency both defensively and offensively, preventing LMU from getting back into the match. With goals from Dragovic, Bachler, Genc and McKenzie, LMU could not get any closer to UCSB than three goals difference.
Next Matches
UC Santa Barbara will host No. 1 on Friday, September 27 at 7 p.m. 1 Will return to Los Angeles to face UCLA. They will then face Cal Lutheran at 9 a.m. and Westcliff at 11 a.m. in Thousand Oaks on Saturday, Sept. 28.