Senior night is an opportunity to celebrate years of commitment and sacrifice from collegiate athletes.

And the Trojans have the opportunity to spoil this special moment for their crosstown rivals.

No. 3 UCLA men’s water polo (18-3, 2-3 MPSF) will face off against No. 4 USC (15-5, 1-4) on Saturday afternoon in the final regular-season match of the year at Spieker Aquatics Center. The Trojans are still looking to avenge their title-game loss to the Bruins in 2025 and have not defeated the Bruins since before last year’s MPSF Championship.

“UCLA, this program, these teams, we have always been built on defense,” said coach Adam Wright. “It’s effort, it’s art, it’s details, and so we have to keep reinforcing those things because when we play great defense then we can get out and start our transition.”

The last time these squads met, defense was indeed the key against USC, as UCLA allowed only nine goals – one of only two single-digit goal tallies on the season for the Trojans. USC’s three highest scorers on the season – two-meter Strahinja Krstic and drivers Robert López Duart and Efe Naipoglu – were held to a single goal each.

Junior attacker Ryder Dodd led the way with four key goals for the Bruins. He enters with a chance to continue his scoring momentum from last weekend, when he broke the UCLA and MPSF single-game scoring record with 12 goals against UC San Diego.

“First half, we knew all of our shots were not going to fall, but second half, we were more fortunate,” Dodd said. “Percentages kind of got to play out.”

In that outing against the Tritons, a lackluster five-goal first half was followed up by a 14-goal second-half showing, including 10 of Dodd’s dozen.

A fourth consecutive double-digit save performance from goalkeeper Griffen Price was key in shutting down the UCSD attack at the other end of the pool. The fifth-year did not make many appearances throughout the middle half of the season, but with four straight starts, he could be a critical option in the cage with the postseason approaching.

Overall, the Bruins are still working to regain momentum after back-to-back losses to then-No. 3 California and No. 2 Stanford a couple of weekends ago. This marked the Bruins’ first pair of consecutive losses since the 2023 season.

UCLA, which is averaging nearly 16 goals per game this season, was held to its first single-digit scoreline of the year against Stanford on Nov. 1, and the upcoming matchup with USC will be its last opportunity to ensure that the goal-scoring threat – outside of a clearly in-form Dodd – is back up and running before the postseason begins.

“We went over those games and kind of try to push those to the side and move on to what we have in front of us,” said junior attacker Bode Brinkema. “We are really not thinking too much about what happened last weekend and just focusing on ourselves again.”

With only six days between Saturday’s matchup and the beginning of the MPSF Championship Tournament, ending the regular season on a high note is a key focus for the blue and gold.