Men's water polo splits weekend road trip

By Moria Khou
Online Forty-Niner
Staff Writer

Long Beach State's men's water polo team swept a double-header on Saturday against Santa Clara and host team, UC Santa Cruz, but were handed an embarrassing loss by Stanford, Sunday.

Fresh off a loss to UCLA, the No. 9 ranked 49ers looked to redeem itself against No. 19 Santa Clara at a neutral site in Santa Cruz. The Beach did just that as they tamed the Broncos to win 11-4.

"Long Beach is a top-10 team and we played well," said Santa Clara's Head Coach, Keith Wilbur. "We just had some breakdowns that they were able to take advantage of."

The 49ers defense played superbly well, allowing only eight shots on goal. Santa Clara found the back of the net in each of the quarters, but it was only one goal.

Goalkeeper Thomas Onyshko had an easy afternoon, as he turned away half of the shots fired his way for four saves total.

Conversely, goalie Peter Moore for the Broncos saw shots from all directions, on his way to make 13 saves. Despite the high number of saves, Moore allowed 11 shots to get through.

Junior Brett McCleave and Blake Bartak combined for six goals, three apiece. Brad Scoles finished with two scores, while Reid Tomassi, Satoshi Sakata, and Clint Wilson all had one goal.

Long Beach State took on UC Santa Cruz in the nightcap and ended Saturday's play with another win. The 49ers easily slipped past the Banana Slugs, 14-6.

UC Santa Cruz started the first quarter exchanging goals with the 49ers as both teams scored twice in the period. In spite of this, the host team played sluggish from that point on, while Long Beach State scored four times in the second, third, and fourth quarters.

The thrashing of the Banana Slugs went on, led by Bartak's second hat trick of the day, the 49ers won by eight goals.

Scoles also found the back of the net three times. Tomassi had two goals. Jay Gerardi, Stefan Ludecke, Eric Markle, McCleave, Sakata, and Wilson all scored once.

UC Santa Cruz goalkeeper, Scott Vaughn finished with seven saves but was topped by Onyshko's nine stops.

With a two game win streak, the 49ers traveled to the Avery Aquatic Center to take on No. 2 Stanford. The Cardinals showed no mercy as they destroyed the 49ers 13-3.

With three games remaining on the schedule, the 49ers will play its two final MPSF matches against UC Irvine on Saturday and USC on Sunday. Both games will start at 12 p.m. at the Campus Pool.