Jan. 28, 2012
SANTA BARBARA, Calif. – The #6 Arizona State University women’s water polo team opened up competition at the UC Santa Barbara Winter Invite on Saturday in Santa Barbara, Calif., winning both their contests on the day with a 17-2 rout of Santa Clara before a hard-fought 9-8 decision over #7 UC-Irvine in the team’s first big test of the season.
Full recaps of each match are below, starting with ASU’s win over Irvine:
#6 ARIZONA STATE 9, #7 UC-Irvine 8
The Sun Devils answered the call of their first early season test, fending off #7 UC-Irvine for a 9-8 victory over the first top-10 ranked team the squad has faced this season faced this season.
The Sun Devils (3-0) jumped to a 7-2 halftime lead but had to withstand a fierce Anteater rally in the second half to hold on for the victory.
We are playing better every game but need to play great defense all game long,” head coach Todd Clapper said after the match. “ We have seen moments of how we have performed in practice, but we need to be more consistent.”
Senior Alicia Brightwell led the team in goals for the second time in three games, netting three, while Shannon Haas added two and four others had a goal a piece as the team showed they can spread the ball around and score from anywhere in the pool.
“I have been happy with our offense so far,” Clapper said “Irvine is a talented, hard-working team and we are happy to come away with the win on short rest.”
Leading 8-5 late in the third, UC-Irvine saw Layne Kipp take an exclusion penalty with about 20 seconds left in the quarter. Haas made the Anteaters pay with 11 seconds left in what would prove to be the deciding goal as she found the net for the second time in the game.
UC-Irvine ripped off three unanswered goals in the fourth quarter to bring the score to 9-8 with over three minutes remaining but could not get the equalizer.
The Sun Devils will take on CSU Bakersfield and Concordia (Calif.) tomorrow on the final day of competition, beginning at 8 a.m. PT.
#6 Arizona State def. #7 UC-Irvine, 9-8
ASU – 4-3-2-0 = 9
UC-Irvine – 1-1-3-3 = 8
Goals
ASU: Brightwell 3, Haas 2, Carter, Pardi, Gao, White
UC-Irvine: Cardey 2, K. Croghan 2, Ward, Morrison, H. Croghan, Irvine #13
__________
#6 ARIZONA STATE 17, Santa Clara 2
The Sun Devils used a stifling defense combined with a powerful offensive attack to put the game away early against Santa Clara and rolled on the way to a 17-2 victory in the opener of the tournament.
ASU jumped out to a 4-0 lead after the first quarter thanks to two goals apiece from seniors Mariam Salloum and Alicia Brightwell. Salloum added her third first-half goal in the second quarter while Kelsey White and Ao Gao added goals to put the Sun Devils up 7-0 at the half.
The rest of the game was a scoring by committee affair as ASU really opened things up as 11 Sun Devils found the back of the net by the time the final buzzer in a total team effort.
Freshmen Gao, Liz Kreek, Makenzy Fowler and Anna Kertes all netted their first career goals in the contest.
The Sun Devil defense was the story though as Kelsey White shut down Santa Clara’s top center and the Broncos managed just nine shot attempts the whole game and sophomore goalkeeper Ianeta Hutchinson fended off seven of them.
The win improved ASU to 2-0 on the season heading into the team’s afternoon matchup against #7 UC-Irvine.
#6 Arizona State def. Santa Clara, 17-2
ASU – 4-3-4-6 = 17
Santa Clara – 0-0-1-1 = 2
Goals
ASU: Salloum 3, Brightwell 2, Carter 2, Leech 2, Gao 2, Kreek, Haas, Pardi, Kertes, Fowler, Young
Santa Clara: Eadington, Bardimere
Saves:
ASU: Hutchinson 7
Sants Clara: Afshar 5