After starting its season in the win column, the No. 14 Long Beach State women’s water polo team has lost three consecutive games with a 13-2 loss to No. 3 UCLA Friday night at Lindgren Aquatics Center.
The Bruins (7-0) jumped out to an early 4-0 lead after the first quarter. As the second quarter began, the 49ers played better defensively, but allowed two more goals to go down 6-0 in the last two minutes of the second quarter.
Although the game wasn’t very close, 49ers coach Gavin Arroyo was proud of how his team continued to fight throughout.
“We have specific goals we set for the team and they accomplished a lot of them today,” Arroyo said. “Of course, there are tons of areas we need to work on, but over the weekend [we] lost to Stanford and they did a lot better today than they did for that game.”
LBSU (1-3) got on the board after junior defender Alexandra Massier scored the first goal for the 49ers to cut the deficit to 6-1 at halftime.
It didn’t take long for UCLA to add to its lead, with a goal in the first two minutes of the third quarter by Bruins’ senior Alys Williams. That goal started a 6-0 run for UCLA as LBSU didn’t have an answer for the Bruins’ attack in the second half.
UCLA’s Rachel Fattal scored another goal to give the Bruins a 9-1 lead after the third quarter.
The Bruins scored two more goals before the halfway mark of the fourth quarter when the Long Beach State center Paige Bennett was excluded from the game.
“They closed the gap a bit and I’m proud of that,” Arroyo said. “It didn’t help losing our center, but our goalie did absolutely spectacular. We were prepared, but I know there is always room for improvement.”
With 3:24 left in the fourth quarter, junior attacker attacker Bridget Reynolds scored for Long Beach.
However, UCLA scored scored the last two goals of the game to finish with the 13-2 win.
Savannah Jones, a huge fan of the LBSU women’s water polo team, said she has definitely seem them in worse times, and the attitude of the team is what will keep them getting better.
“They always come out of the water with a great attitude,” Jones said, “knowing that they will do better the next game. They don’t dwell on the fact that they lost; they have a positive outlook on the score and know it could’ve gone worse.”
LBSU will be back in action when it travels to La Jolla to compete in the Triton Invitational Feb. 11 at 9 a.m.