Polo model of consistency

Tuesday, May 14, 1996Bruins play together to earn championshipBy
Mark J. Dittmer

Daily Bruin Contributor

If the women’s water polo player in your class has a big smile
on her face this morning while the rest of the class can barely
keep their eyes open, she is probably thinking back to Sunday.

Because it was in the latter part of Sunday, around 5 p.m., when
the Bruins secured their national championship. And the high of a
collegiate championship should ideally last well over 48 hours.

The Bruins finished off their season with a 29-1 record, but
most important, they won their last three games and, in doing so,
arrived in Westwood Sunday night the national champions.

UCLA finished in top form by righting the wrongs that led to its
8-7 loss to California two weeks ago. Bruin head coach Guy Baker
said the team was playing in spurts then, and when the team reached
Davis last weekend, there would be no more of that. Consistency
ruled the day.

Consistency? The Bruins steamrolled Maryland, which finished
tenth in the tournament, and Santa Barbara, which finished eighth,
by a combined score of 22-2.

On Saturday, UCLA played fifth-place Stanford in the
tournament’s quarterfinals. The Bruins took an 8-0 lead with plenty
of time remaining in the third quarter and they cruised with it,
winning 8-1.

By the time the weekend was over, playing in spurts seemed as
distant as sucking one’s thumb.

By the tournament’s end, "It was a total team effort," Baker
said. As usual, the Bruins’ regular cast of characters all got into
the act.

Jennifer McFerrin, Coralie Simmons and Catherine von Schwarz did
most of the scoring throughout the weekend. They combined for 11 of
UCLA’s 12 goals against SDSU. In the championship, McFerrin scored
three times. Von Schwarz supplied the two key go-ahead goals in the
second quarter.

And Simmons, who usually does the largest share of UCLA’s
scoring, was more involved with defense and passing in the
championship on Sunday. It was her one goal, though, that may have
broken California’s back. Immediately after Katie Tenenbaum’s goal
made it 5-1, Simmons made a leaping steal, and took the ball
herself all the way to the Cal goal. She put it in to make the lead
6-1.

Mandy McAloon, Katie Tenenbaum, Stephanie Natcher and Amanda
Gall were regularly setting people up on the offensive end; McAloon
was seen especially often setting up Simmons for goals. And Megan
Oesting won just about every sprint of the tournament, and was
responsible for putting UCLA ahead 1-0 in the championship.

"We’ve been playing real well," said Baker, on the Saturday
evening after the Bruins beat San Diego State. "We’ve got our speed
back."

Tenenbaum, McAloon and McFerrin played the biggest parts
defensively, but everyone played a role. And of course the best
defensive performance of all was by goalie Nicholle Payne in the
championship game.

Payne may have gotten the most work during the championship as
she did in any game all season. Through the majority of the year,
Payne has not had as many save opportunities because UCLA generally
keeps the ball on the opponent’s side of the pool. In that way,
Sunday’s championship game was a return to last year for Payne,
when she was forced to make acrobatic saves on a regular basis.

She certainly showed she has lost nothing from the previous
season; so much so that she was awarded the Trisha McGwire trophy,
awarded to the best goalie of the national championship
tournament.

UCLA certainly showed that it had made the improvements
necessary to turn its loss two weeks ago around on the Bears. The
Bruins not only beat an excellent Cal team, they broke the game
open by halftime. If the Bears seemed golden enough to pull off an
upset going into the tournament, they looked like they had a long
way to go afterwards, especially at the end of the first half.

In a tournament where everything went almost exactly according
to seed, the Bruins upheld their part of the bargain, and kept any
upsets from happening.

FRED HE/Daily Bruin

UCLA’s Katie Tenenbaum played a huge defensive role in Sunday’s
national championship victory over Cal.