Earlier this season, after his team’s first loss to Stanford, UCLA women’s water polo coach Brandon Brooks said that his team needed to hone its “killer instinct” toward the end of tough games if it wanted to win a national title.
Facing Stanford once again in Sunday night’s NCAA championship game, UCLA once again fell to Stanford after falling apart toward the end of the game.
Going into the last period, the game was tied 5-5. Two minutes in, Stanford scored its first goal as Cardinal senior Annika Dries splashed one in from center. 26 seconds later, senior Kaley Dodson got another goal. Within a minute, Dries struck again, putting Stanford up 8-5. The Cardinal went on to win 9-5, securing the national title.
For Dries, those goals were a blur.
“I was just thinking, ‘Next stop, get the defense,’ then I saw Kaley (scoring),” Dries said. “I think everyone stepped up. That’s inspiring.”
At that point, UCLA looked to make a comeback in the last three minutes and change. Another goal from Dodson, though, seemed to crush those hopes, and the Bruins seemed to slow down into the last minute of the game.
UCLA opened the weekend with the same type of performance against UC San Diego it has exhibited in games against lower-ranked opponents all season: After only allowing one goal, redshirt junior goalkeeper Sami Hill was excluded in the first half, and players began to come in off the bench. UCSD scored five times against backup goalie Alex Musselman in the fourth period, but the Bruins still carried the day 12-8.
The next day, UCLA took on USC in the semifinals in a heavily defensive game. UCLA jumped to a 4-2 lead at the half before the teams’ defenses held each other to one goal each in the second half.
In the east-west facing pool, concerns about the sun getting in the goalkeepers’ eyes led the teams to switch sides every quarter during the early evening, instead of every half. Hill, however, wasn’t particularly fazed by the issue that would come up again against Stanford.
“For me, (the sun) doesn’t matter. If our defense is playing the way it’s supposed to be playing, I think we can handle the sun,” Hill said.
Whether it was the sun or something else, UCLA’s defense was certainly not playing the way it was supposed to be playing by the end of the championship game on Sunday night, giving up seven unanswered goals.
“We did a really good job for three quarters and forcing their shots to come from where we wanted them to come from. Anytime we’ve struggled this year, we’ve had breakdowns in communication and we gave up some goals,” Brooks said, channeling the same issues toward the end of the game his team has had all season.
In a press conference after the USC game, Brooks mentioned that his team is “fairly young,” compared to a seasoned group of juniors and seniors starting for Stanford.
Hill thought that nerves might have contributed to the team’s fourth period struggles. Saturday, she said she was “really jittery,” and Sunday she said that the team was “nervous for the game.”
“I think we had really good energy and we just had a little bit of a breakdown,” Hill said at a postgame press conference.
Stanford coach John Tanner had a different perspective on Stanford’s strong finish to the game, seeing it as part of his team’s strategy.
“We set the second half up in the first half, so we get great contribution from all our (players),” Tanner said. “Then we turn Kaley (Dodson) loose in the second half.”
UCLA sophomore attacker Rachel Fattal seemed fairly optimistic, despite the loss.
“I always see us going forward. I can only see us getting better next year, and I can only see this loss as fueling us next year,” Fattal said.
For now, however, the season is over, and Stanford stands above everyone else.
“It’s been a fun day,” Dries said after the game.