Coming off a victory against Arizona State last weekend at the UCI Invitational, UCLA women’s water polo turns the page as it heads to Tempe, Ariz. to face the Sun Devils again Saturday.
UCLA said that it came into this week with a new insight into what ASU had to offer as well as an idea of what drills would help the Bruins defend against the Sun Devils’ offensive plays. UCLA started off the week with scrimmaging drills as well as a drop, or interior, defense around an aggressive center player and a few six-on-five man-up situations.
“I think we focused mostly on that (scrimmaging) today because we have to progress during the week and towards the end of the week we will focus more on the six-on-five (man-up situations),” said senior attacker Gisselle Naranjo.
Because ASU concentrated on playing only a few players during the weekend, a deep UCLA team was able to defeat them 14-7. The Sun Devils’ main lineup did not receive as many substitutions as the Bruins’ did.
“We played (ASU) the fourth game of the weekend and that’s a lot of games for them and for us too. They are not a very deep team, meaning they don’t have a lot of really good players,” said freshman defender Alys Williams.
“There is a starting lineup and some of the bench but by the end of the tournament they are all tired and sore, and they didn’t have a lot of subs and just got out of it, so we were able to take control.”
The Sun Devils were constructed internationally, meaning that they were able to draw players with international playing experience from many different continents, as well as a few strong players from the United States, in order to put the team in contention for a national title, unlike UCLA, which recruits mainly from California.
“They have a goalie from New Zealand, two players from Australia; they have one from China, two from Hungary and they have another player from New Zealand and then they have domestic players,” said coach Brandon Brooks. “They have pretty strong weapons offensively. They have a couple of big lefties and they have some really good shooters.
Though the Bruins defeated the Sun Devils using much of their talented lineup, UCLA knows it cannot come into this weekend with too much confidence, especially because the team is on the road against an ASU squad that has a week’s worth of UCLA-specific practice under its belt as well.
“I expect it to be a very close game and a very hard game. Things are different,” Brooks said. “This is a conference game and they’ll be prepared just for us. We have to prepare for a battle.”