Malibu, Calif. – The No. 5 Pepperdine men's water polo team is on to the Golden Coast Conference Tournament Championship thanks to a 10-9 overtime win over UC Santa Barbara on Saturday. It will mark the first time the team has reached the championship game since winning the inaugural tournament in 2016.
The Waves (23-7) got hat tricks from both Balazs Kosa and Sean Thomas, lifting the team over the Gauchos (20-7) who had three players with two goals apiece.
GAME RECAP
The early goings of the game were relatively slow, with only three total goals scored in the first quarter. Sean Ferrari (Redwood City, Calif./St. Francis HS) got the Waves on the board after UCSB took a 1-0 lead. Kosa (Budapest, Hungary/Csik Ferenc Altalanos Iskola es Gimnazium) then scored with 3:15 left on the clock to give the Waves a 2-1 lead heading into the second quarter. The Gauchos scored three times in the second to tie the game at halftime after Kosa scored his second goal on a penalty to open the second and Curtis Jarvis (Huntington Beach, Calif./Huntington Beach HS) scored one of his two goals of the day. The game was tied at four at the half.
The second half was much like the first, as UCSB scored the first two goals of the third quarter. Jarvis got his second goal of the day halfway through the third, and the Gauchos took a 6-5 lead into the final eight minutes. Thomas tied the game with 4:14 to play, but the Gauchos retook the lead a minute later. Thomas tied the game again with 1:55 to play and the game moved to overtime tied at seven.
In the first overtime period Thomas completed his hat trick to put the Waves back on top. Then, after UCSB tied the game at eight, Kosa scored his third of the game to give the Waves a 9-8 lead. Ferrari then gave the Waves an insurance goal that would prove the game winner as UCSB scored with 13 seconds left to come within one goal. The Waves held on to the ball and secured a spot in the Championship on Sunday.
STATS
SCORING: PEPP—2—2—1—2—3—0—10 ; UCSB—1—3—2—1—1—1—9
GOALS: PEPP— Kosa (3), Thomas (3), Jarvis (2), Ferrari (2) ; UCSB— C. BrosnaN (2), Chambliss (2), Gvozdanovic (2), Fellner, Lott, Nangle
SAVES: PEPP— JC Marco (14) ; UCSB— Roland (9)
UP NEXT
The Waves take on Long Beach State, who beat Pacific in the afternoon game, in the GCC Championship tomorrow at 1 pm. Before that, UCSB takes on Pacific in the third place game at 11.
