Waterpolo briefs

Tuesday, December 1, 1998

Waterpolo briefs

Waves wipe out Bruins; UCLA out of NCAA finals

The UCLA men's water polo team placed sixth at the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) tournament and consequently missed qualifying for the NCAA Championships.

The Bruins fell out of conference championship contention in their first outing against Pepperdine.

The Bruins seemed poised to win by the third quarter with a tie score. The Waves, featuring three seniors - Todd King, Jeremy Pope and Merrill Moses - from last year's NCAA championship team, narrowly advanced to the semifinal by beating the Bruins 7-6.

With that loss went the automatic spot in the NCAA championships that goes to the conference tournament winner.

Being the No. 2 ranked team in the nation after No. 1 USC, the Bruins' chance to get the at-large bid relied on USC winning the tournament. All they could do from that point was to root for their rival team, which had won the early round against Long Beach State.

The Bruins beat the University of the Pacific 8-5 in the consolation semifinal in what was considered as one of the most chaotic games. With UOP's physical playing style and verbally offensive fans, the referee threw out two UOP fans and UCLA head coach Guy Baker in the game's duration.

Even with the crowd, constant halting calls by officials and lack of a coach, UCLA pulled through to beat UOP under assistant coach Adam Krikorian's direction.

"Adam did a good job with the players and the team rose to the occasion," said Baker. "There was definitely some adversity and I'm glad we could handle it."

After all the morning glory, the Bruins were faced with the disappointing news that USC lost to Stanford in the semifinal round in a sudden-death overtime game.

Stanford gets an automatic spot in the NCAA championship tournament. Because of USC's higher regular season record, the Trojans get the at-large bid to the four-team tournament next week instead of the Bruins.

Knowing the inevitable, it was useless to win the consolation final which would have given the Bruins a fifth place tournament finish. They lost to Cal, 7-6, and finished sixth in an overtime game.

The Bruins end their season with a 17-6 overall and 6-2 conference record.

Written by Steve Kim, Daily Bruin Senior Staff

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