UCLA women’s water polo overcomes Cal’s lockdown defense
Senior defender Charlotte Pratt helped to keep UCLA’s matchup with Cal close, tallying a second-half score that helped the Bruins emerge victorious from the low-scoring battle. (Mackenzie Possee/Daily Bruin)
By Kelsey Angus
March 26, 2016 1:15 p.m.
BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA — UCLA women’s water polo came out firing in the third quarter against Cal Friday after a slow offensive start. On the Bruins’ first possession of the half, senior center India Forster sailed one past the goalkeeper and junior attacker Kelsey O’Brien followed soon after to build their lead to 3-1.
No. 2 UCLA (16-2, 1-0 MPSF) pulled off a 4-3 victory Friday in Berkeley over No. 8 California (18-4, 1-0 MPSF) after a hard-fought, defense-dominated game.
The Golden Bears took control of the tempo from the first whistle. In the first quarter, the Bruins were missing simple passes and were shut down offensively. Despite these struggles, they were able to hold the deficit to one at the close of the first quarter.
Midway through the second quarter, freshman attacker Lizette Rozeboom was finally able to find the back of the net for UCLA.
“We really needed the goal at that point in the game, and I was just really happy that it was going in,” Rozeboom said.
Although the first half was marked with offensive gridlock, the Bruins were creating difficult situations for the Golden Bears’ scoring attack as well.
“Our team defense was the difference in this game,” said senior goalkeeper Alex Musselman, “We were communicating, we were dropping off who we wanted to drop off of and we had big field blocks.”
Coming out of the locker room after half, the team looked different. The Bruins were able to immediately take control of the tempo following goals from Forster and O’Brien in the first few possessions.
Cal countered with another goal, but senior defender Charlotte Pratt answered quickly for UCLA to bring the team’s lead back to two.
“Starting from the first half, I think we were struggling a bit on offense, but we were always executing our defense,” said Musselman. “My main focus was to keep the defense up and the offense will come. And that ended up happening in the third quarter.”
Strong play from both teams’ goalies kept it a low scoring game. Still, the Bruins were able to create offensive opportunities when it really counted.
“I think the whole game we only had brief glimpses of poised offense, and then we had really good opportunities,” said coach Brandon Brooks. “But during a lot of it I think we let the moment get to us a bit and we were really rushed.”
Brooks emphasized the importance of the team gaining experience against high-caliber teams so that the players know how to bring that experience and mindset to everything they do.
“We need to match our intensity in practice with the same level it was here,” said Brooks. “If we do that, we are going to improve greatly.”
