Man of the Auer ... Waves Upset Stanford, 8-7

MALIBU, Calif. Â He sat on the sidelines most of the season with a ruptured eardrum, but today it was all about Brett Auer who led the No. 4 Pepperdine men’s water polo to an 8-7 upset over No. 2 Stanford in the MPSF Tournament semifinals.

The Waves will battle top-ranked USC at 3:30 p.m. at Raleigh Runnels Memorial Pool. 

In a closely contested match that went into overtime and saw the score tie four times, the Waves left everything in the pool and advanced to the MPSF finals after scoring the winning goal in the second overtime. Goalkeeper John Hahn had 12 saves in the cage while Jimmie Sandman recorded 11 for Stanford.

Pepperdine came out fighting in the first period scoring three goals to Stanford’s one. The second period saw a Cardinal surge with Stanford outscoring the Waves 2-to-1 and ending the half with the score tied 3-3.

Stanford continued its fight for an opportunity to play in the finals with two more goals scored in the third period. The Waves were down by one at 5-4.

Janson Wigo scored the first goal of the fourth period on a Stanford power play to give the Cardinal their largest lead of the match at 6-4. With 1:09 left in the fourth period Auer (Newport Beach, Calif./ Newport Beach HS) scored a goal on a 6-on-5 opportunity to make the score 6-5. Stanford missed a scoring opportunity and the Waves took possession of the ball with 44 seconds left in the match. Auer scored again with 24 seconds on the clock to tie the match 6-6.

Neither team was able to score in the first overtime. The second overtime opened with a goal by Adam Hewko (Irvine, Calif./ Servite HS) with 2:21 on the clock. Stanford answered back 17 seconds later with a goal by Peter Sefton to tie the score at 7-7. With 46 seconds on the clock it looked as though the match would go to sudden death. Pepperdine had possession of the ball and Coach Jack Kocur called a 30 second timeout. The Waves executed a play and Auer completed his hat trick to score the winning goal of the game.

Stanford vs. Pepperdine

                              1       2         3       4      OT1       OT2

Stanford                 1      2        2      1        0            1      7

Pepperdine             3      0       1      2        0            2      8

Stanford Goals: (Andrew Drake 1, Drac Wigo 2, Jacob Smith 1, Janson Wigo 2, Peter Sefton 1,

Pepperdine Goals: (Grant Miller 1, Clayton Snyder 1, J.P. MacDonell 2, Brett Auer 3, Adam Hewko 1,

Goalie Saves: John Hahn (Pep) 12, Jimmie Sandman (Stanford) 11

California vs. UC Irvine

                                       1       2       3       4      OT1      OT2      SD1       SD2

CAL                         2      3        4       2       1           0           0        0

UCI                          3      4        1       3       1           0           0        1

CAL Goals (Brian Dudley 3,Trent Calder 2, Luca Saponjic 1, Cory Nasoff 2, Spencer Warden 2, Jack Sample 1, Frank Reynolds 1,)

UCI Goals: (Greg Enloe 3, James Frank 2, Griffin Lerman 1,Thomas Kruip 2, Jess Hatch 1, Brandon Johnson 4,)

Goalie Saves: Matt Johnson (UCI) 9, Jacob MacIntosh (Cal) 2, Wil Toppen 3

UC Irvine and California went into overtime and double sudden death periods before Irvine clinched the match with a 5-meter penalty shot by Brandon Johnson. Johnson scored four goals for the Anteaters while teammate Greg Enloe had a hat trick. Brian Dudley led the Bears offense with a hat trick. UC Irvine will play for fifth place tomorrow at 11:30 a.m. Cal will play Long Beach at 10 a.m. for seventh place.

Long Beach vs. UCSB

                           1       2       3        4      OT1     OT2       SD1

Long Beach         2      3       3        3         1         0           0      12  

UCSB                   3     1       4        3          0        1            1      13

Long Beach Goals: (Jake Kinne 3, Pavlee Filipovic 2, Jesse Koeppen 2, Justin Koeppen 1, Jeff Greenwood 1,  Aleksander Petrovic 1, Ashley Blythen 1, Kevin Van Haaster 1)

UCSB Goals: (Milos Golic 5, Jesse Tootell 1, Miles Price 1, Sean Castillo 1, Dane Lindstrom 1,  Noah Smith 2, Stefan Partelow 1, Daniel Natalizio 1,)

Goalie Saves: Michael Robinson (UCSB) 14, Derk Weibe-Bailey (Long Beach) 7

UC Santa Barbara defeated Long Beach in a closely contested match that went into sudden death and ended with Milo Golic scoring the winning goal for Santa Barbara, 13-12. Golic scored five goals for the Gauchos while Jake Kinne had a hat trick for Long Beach. The match tied eight times. UC Santa Barbara plays UC Irvine tomorrow for fifth place at 1:30 p.m. Long Beach meets California at 10 a.m. for seventh place.

USC vs. UCLA

                               1      2      3      4

USC                        4      2       2     1       9

UCLA                      0      2       1     2       5

USC Goals: (J.W. Krumpholz 2, Peter Kurzeka 2, Matt Sagehorn 1, Jovan Vranes 1, Shea Buckner 1, Anthony Artukovich 1, Devon Borisoff 1,)

UCLA Goals: (Scott Davidson 2, Cullen Hennessy 1, Krsto Sbutega 1, Ben Hohl 1,)

Goalie Saves: Chay Lapin (UCLA) 7, Joel Dennerley (USC) 5

USC maintained its perfect record with a win in the semi finals over UCLA, 9-5, on Saturday. The Trojans held the lead throughout the match with a 4-0 score in the first period. USC was up 6-2 at the half with both team scoring three goals in the second half. Peter Kruzeka and J.W. Krumpholz scored two goals each for the Trojans while Scott Davidson shot two in the cage for the Bruins. No.1 USC heads to the MPSF finals tomorrow at 3:30 p.m. to meet the winner of the Pepperdine vs. Stanford match.

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