For the fourth time this year, the UCLA and USC women’s water polo teams battled to the bitter end in the pool. But in their final and most important matchup, it was the Bruins who emerged from the pool without a victory.
The No. 2 seeded Bruins went back and forth with the women of Troy for much of the first half but found themselves trailing late due to the sharp shooting of USC and fell in the semifinals of the NCAA Championship, 12-10.
UCLA (22-4) found itself struggling to build momentum on offense in the second half, allowing USC to go on a 3-0 run starting in the last two minutes of the third quarter.
The Trojans (23-5) scored once more with 4:53 remaining in the match to bring their lead to 12-8. UCLA countered with two goals down the stretch but simply ran out of time after failing to force a steal in the final seconds.
“Any time you put your heart and your soul into a team and a season and you lose like this it hurts really bad,” coach Brandon Brooks said.
“I’m very proud of the way this team competed. My hat goes off to “˜SC. They made some really nice shots.”
This game marks the highest-scoring matchup between the two teams this season. Senior attacker Sarah Orozco and junior utility Emily Greenwood had three goals apiece but could not match the unrelenting pressure of freshman driver Monica Vavic and junior two-meter Patricia Jansco, each of whom had four goals for the Trojans.
USC rained in several key shots from beyond five-meter, showcasing a much more explosive offense than in past games.
“It’s really hard not to consider the history between the teams,” senior utility KK Clark said. “We’ve seen them I don’t know how many times. It seems like we always match up against them in tournaments and in semifinals.”
“We’ve seen them quite a few times this year, but it’s no excuse. We know their players really well.”
UCLA’s players were visibly upset following the hard-fought game, but were quick to compliment the Trojans on their strong offensive performance.
“They had a lot of really nice bar-ins,” senior goalkeeper Caitlin Dement said.
A disappointed UCLA squad will take on No. 4 seed UC Irvine tomorrow afternoon in a matchup for third place, not quite the grand finale the team had in mind.
This afternoon’s battle was the first in four matchups in which the Bruins failed to find a hero in the fourth quarter. It will also be the only one they have in the back of their minds until January.
“Ultimately we got beat. I don’t think we beat ourselves,” Brooks said.
“This time of year you want to go out and compete for the whole game. I think we were there neck and neck and they beat us.”