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Thursday, March 19, 1998

Day after day, win after win, team shows why it's on top

Seemingly invincible, women spice up season with rivalry

By Steve Kim

Daily Bruin Staff

After warming up with a 14-3 win against the University of Massachusetts Tuesday, the No. 1 UCLA women's water polo team gets ready to heat up the Sunset Recreation Center pool as it plays its biggest rival, California, Saturday at noon.

The Bruins love to dominate, and that's what they did against the UMass Minutewomen. They provided their guests with a fast and exciting first quarter and left the Minutewomen struck and dazed, seven goals to none. After that, it was almost hopeless for the unsuspecting opponent.

Amanda Gall, who played aggressively from the start, helped set the mood of the game by scoring the first goal.

"We sometimes come out sluggish in the first quarter, which is a bad habit of ours," Gall said. "But last several games, we've been coming out hard from the beginning so we're breaking our habit and improving."

Junior Coralie Simmons was back in action after a game absence, and she made up for it with three leading goals. She showed the Minutewomen just how water polo is played when she drilled one in from a good 10 yards with an opponent guarding all over her.

Despite constant shouting of "foul her!" by the UMass head coach, the Bruins were unstoppable. Bruin defender Mandy McAloon flaunted her offensive flair by netting in two goals. Gall, Katie Tenenbaum and Erin Golaboski also chipped in two goals apiece for the Bruins.

"We have a tendency to jump on teams that haven't played teams like ours," said UCLA head coach Guy Baker. "We jumped on them early in the game, and they got adjusted to how we play. We let down a little by the end."

The Bruins may have loosened up by the end but even when given the opportunity, the Minutewomen were only good for a few minutes. By the time UMass turned it up in a fourth quarter three-goal streak, it was way too late for them to play catch-up. Losing 14-3, it was rather a gloomy trip to sunny California.

Tuesday's game provided good practice for the Bruins' Saturday matchup with Cal. Beside the usual heated rivalry, this game plays an especially important role, since Cal beat the Bruins several weeks ago at the Santa Barbara Tournament's final game (9-8). Beating the Bruins in sudden death, the Golden Bears provided a highly challenging, exciting game.

"It was probably the best game of the year in collegiate water polo so far," said UCLA assistant coach Adam Krikorian. "We're looking forward to another big game like that, with the same intensity. We've been rivals for the past three years but at the same time we have a lot of respect for each other."

While UCLA has two US National Team members (Simmons and Nicolle Payne), Cal has Alisa von Hartizsch as an experienced international competitor. The Golden Bears are a constant threat and Baker says they have the potential to beat the Bruins on any given day.

"We've got to play a good game," Baker said. "I anticipate it'll go right down to the end."

Sure they respect each other, but they also want to beat each other. Junior Catherine von Schwarz predicts that if her Bruin teammates and her do the job right, they can take the victory.

"Any team can play with us with high intensity but I don't think one can keep that intensity against us for the whole game," von Schwarz said. "If we come out strong like we should, then I think we can beat them."

After a good, vigorous game against Cal, they'll warm down to an easier Sunday noon game against No. 16 University of Pacific at the Men's Gym Pool. Playing against a team of lower caliber, Baker stresses that his team should not relax too much and let down on the intensity.

Added to the pressure of the back-to-back games is the upcoming finals week.

"Lets not even bring that into this," laughs team captain Payne. "Lets just say we're going try to focus on both."

These Bruins will have to perform a difficult juggling act of mind and body to make it through this weekend successfully. But then again, they've been through it before.