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Junior driver Molly Cahill and the Bruins advance to the National Championship game against cross

Correction appended

Huddled around on a patch of grass as night fell, the UCLA women's water polo team watched coach Adam Krikorian point out each player's significance in Saturday's match.

After a near-perfect game that saw UCLA blow out rival Stanford, 8-5, the Bruins can smell a repeat national championship. All that stands in their way is powerhouse USC.

“Sure we’re one step away, but it’s a long step,” said Krikorian, who will be in search of his fourth national championship in the last six years.

“We picked a good time to play our best water polo. That was our best game of the year.”

The championship match, which will be a 5 p.m. bout at the Ted and Rand Schaal Aquatics Center on the campus of UC Davis, will be between the national champions of the last two seasons.

Asked if there are going to be any butterflies going against coach Jovan Vavic’s Trojans, Krikorian swatted down that idea.

“We’ve been there and we’ve done it before. We know what it takes,” he said.

It won’t be easy for the third-seeded Bruins (28-4), especially with the way the top-seeded Trojans (28-2) have knocked around their opponents this season. To get into the championship game, USC gutted out a 9-7 win over fourth-seeded Hawai’i (18-11) after falling 4-2 in the second period.

"They're big, strong and fast," said Krikorian, whose Bruins hold a 1-2 record

head-to-head this season with the Trojans. "They got two of the best centers (Moriah van

Norman and Lauren Wenger) in the country. You don't win 26 games in a row to be a slouch of a team.”

UCLA can almost taste its 99th national championship.

“If it comes, it comes. It’ll be great for our school and sport,” sophomore Gabrielle Domanic said.

Last year, Stanford (23-5) fell 4-3 in a heartbreaking championship loss to the Bruins in Michigan. Asked how it feels to come short again, after having won this season’s conference tournament, Stanford goalie Meredith McColl choked up. Stanford coach John Tanner had to interject.

“It obviously isn’t easy,” he said. “It’s very frustrating for Meredith and for our whole team. We had our seniors from last year watching here, hoping we would come up on the top.”

The Bruins aren’t known for their quick starts, but Domanic took it upon herself to assert some vigor into the team. Domanic had a finger on two goals, scoring in the opening minute and then finding senior Thalia Munro for a skip shot to give UCLA a 2-0 lead. Everything seemed to go UCLA’s way. With the shot clock winding down, Kristina Kunkel rocketed an 8-meter shot to give UCLA an almost insurmountable 3-0 lead.

“It was intense in the beginning,” Domanic said. “We attacked from the start and as long as that fire gets up, it’s contagious in the bench and the water.”

The Cardinal mounted a comeback with a two-goal run in the second period to bring the game to a 4-3 UCLA advantage. But UCLA leading scorer Kelly Rulon, who notched a game-high three goals, found the back of the goal in back-to-back possessions – one unassisted and one on a 4-meter penalty shot which Kacy Kunkel drew on Cardinal Laurel Champion. Rulon now has 66 goals on the season, which puts her third all-time in UCLA’s individual season scoring records. (Coralie Simmons is atop that list with 74 goals and last season Rulon notched 70.)

“This is a different UCLA team than two weeks ago,” said Tanner, referring to the Cardinal’s 8-5 semifinal win in the MPSF tournament.

The Bruins held the Cardinal scoreless in the third period as they took a 7-3 advantage into the final period and cruised the rest of the way.

Stanford was woeful on its man-advantage plays. The Cardinal went 2-for-11 to the Bruins’ 3-for-6.

UCLA junior goalie Emily Feher had a stellar game finishing with a game-high nine saves, which included stopping Katie Hansen’s 4-meter penalty shot.

As for Tanner’s take on the championship game against the Bruins and the Trojans, he was trite.

“If UCLA plays like this, they’ll have an extremely good chance of winning,” Tanner said.

After a quick bite to eat at Plutos Restaurant for dinner, Krikorian and the team will once again prepare. They'll watch video. They'll go over their game plan.

But they all know what's at stake - No. 99.