Men’s water polo aims to break SoCal tournament losing streak
Sophomore attacker Jack Grover, who has five goals on the season, said defense will be the priority for UCLA at this weekend’s Kap7 SoCal Invitational. (Aubrey Yeo/Daily Bruin senior staff)
By Savannah Shapiro
Oct. 9, 2015 12:51 a.m.
In recent history, the Kap7 SoCal Invitational has spelled difficulty for UCLA men’s water polo.
The Bruins have lost at least one game in each of their last 16 Southern California Invitational appearances.
The No. 1 Bruins (13-0, 1-0 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation) will have to end that streak at this weekend’s competition in order to stay undefeated on the year.
“These tournaments have always been major points of the season where you can really see where you stand,” said coach Adam Wright. “I’m willing to bet that everyone has gotten a whole lot better since (the Kap7) NorCal (Invitational). It’s normal and I think we have too.”
In past years, the tournament has pitted UCLA against top-notch teams like California, Stanford and USC. This year should be no different, as the No. 2 Trojans and No. 3 Cardinal line up as potential opponents.
The uncertainty of the matchups that comes along with the SoCal tournament is what makes the invite such a challenge.
“There’s a lot of teams to prepare for in these tournaments,” Wright said. “We know right now we are going to play Pomona. From there, we don’t know. You have to get yourself ready for anybody that we could potentially see.”
Thus far, the Bruins have embraced the challenges of this season. Facing ranked opponents allows them to measure themselves against the best and determine whether they need to make adjustments, said junior goalkeeper Garrett Danner.
“It’s always good to go and hopefully get a chance to play one of the teams in the top four,” Danner said. “It’s always a big game for us and it’s always good to get some competition like that to see where we stand compared to the last big tournament where we played a couple of teams out of the top four.”
The upcoming tournament provides a chance for the Bruins to showcase increased intensity as compared to previous years.
“What’s happened in the past, doesn’t affect us now,” Danner said. “We are just looking forward to playing our game and having a better tournament than we’ve had in the past.”
This season, the Bruins have displayed a strong defense, a critical aspect when facing teams in the top four. At times when the offense is slower to produce, UCLA can rely on its backbone and use its dominant defense as support.
“Defense is definitely our priority and it’s something we take a lot of pride in,” said sophomore attacker Jack Grover. “Every game has its own challenges, we just take it one game at a time and stick to our plan.”
Having played the majority of this season’s games against lower-ranked opponents, the Bruins will use the SoCal tournament as an indicator of where they stand almost halfway through their regular season.
“We can’t really look past anyone, because ultimately we can’t control what the other teams are doing and who’s winning and who’s not winning,” Wright said. “As far as a litmus test, it will show us where we are after this weekend.”
