The UC Santa Barbara Men’s Water Polo team was in Malibu on Thursday, where they faced Westcliff and No. 4 Pepperdine, finishing the day with a win and a loss.
The Gauchos (7-4) defeated the Warriors (1-5) for the second time in five days, 15-4, but fell to the hosting Waves (7-1), 13-8.
“We were a little out of sync throughout the match (against Pepperdine),” Wigo said. “We had a few opportunities to get back into the game in the third and fourth quarters but could not capitalize when we needed to.
“Pepperdine has a great team this year and they played excellent, but we were hoping for a much better result.”
NO. 11 UC Santa Barbara 15, Westcliff 4
Like they did last weekend, the Gauchos dominated their game against Westcliff in the afternoon.
While the Warriors did score first, when UC Santa Barbara took the lead midway through the first quarter, they never gave it back.
Back-to-back second-quarter goals from Ryan McManigal capped off a 7-0 Gauchos run, and they would lead, 7-2, at halftime.
The two teams traded two goals each to start off the third quarter, then UC Santa Barbara scored the game’s final six goals to secure the win.
Those goals came in twos, with Luke Redoutey tallying back-to-back, then watching Brock Zamanian do the same.
In the final 1:18, Redoutey scored two more to bring his total to four on the game. Leif Lacy played the first half in goal for the Gauchos, making five saves, with Wyatt Pieretti taking the second half and making seven.
No. 4 Pepperdine 13, No. 11 UC Santa Barbara 8
Dash McFarland put the Gauchos on the board first in the evening match, but a 4-0 run gave the home team the lead shortly after.
Adam Gyenis scored to open the second quarter and cut the lead to two, but again the Waves pulled away.
Goals from freshmen Luke Bachler and Finn Genc cut the Pepperdine lead down again late in the first half, and it was a 7-4 game when the halftime buzzer sounded.
However, the Waves assembled a 5-0 run from the end of the second quarter through the third, putting the game largely out of the Gauchos’ reach.
Nathan Darby scored and McFarland finished his hat-trick to cut the lead back to four, but that was as close as the Gauchos would get.
Sam McKenzie scored the final goal of the game with just over a minute left. In goal for UC Santa Barbara, Levi Lentin made six saves.
UC Santa Barbara is set to face a pair of California powerhouses this weekend, taking on No. 3 USC in Los Angeles on Saturday before returning to Santa Barbara to take on No. 6 Stanford on Sunday.
Saturday’s contest will begin at 1 p.m. from the Uytengsu Aquatics Center in Los Angeles, with a live stream on pac-12.com and live stats available through ucsbgauchos.com.
Sunday’s match against Stanford has been moved and will now be played at Santa Barbara High School.
As a result of this move, fans will only be able to follow the match by watching live on ESPN+ or by following the live stats available on ucsbgauchos.com. The match is still scheduled to begin at 12 p.m.