No. 5 Trojans take fourth in MPSF Invitational
No. 5 USC finished fourth at the MPSF Invitational in Stanford, Calif. last weekend, taking wins over No. 17 Fordham and No. 7 UC Davis but losing to crosstown rival No. 2 (T) UCLA and No. 2 (T) Cal.
In their two losses of the tournament, the Trojans ended only one goal short of their opponent in both games. USC lost to UCLA 13-12 and to Cal 11-10.
After playing neck-and-neck for their entire semifinal game, USC couldn’t catch up to the Bruins and conceded their first weekend loss. The Bruins finished second overall in the tournament, losing only to Stanford in the finals. This is USC’s second loss to UCLA this season, and they still have at least one more matchup against the Bruins to go in the regular conference season.
USC’s matchup for third place pitted them against Cal, their first matchup of the season thus far. Despite being shutout in two out of four quarters against the Bears, the Trojans fought their way back from a three-point deficit to take the lead entering the fourth quarter. However, that lead quickly drowned after two successful 6-on-5 possessions by Cal, and the Bears took the third place slot in the tournament.
“Our 6-on-5 conversion up to that point in the tournament was actually very good, but again in that last quarter if we had scored two goals and if we had stopped them, we would have won the game,” said Head Coach Marko Pintaric.
After this weekend’s competition, four specific Trojans have continued to show consistent and significant offensive achievements. Graduate student Massimo Di Maritre, who has earned MPSF Newcomer of the Week two out of the three weeks this season, leads the Trojans in individual points with 32 goals. Marcus Longton, senior driver, continues his streak of scoring in all 14 games this season, the only Trojan to do so this year. Redshirt senior 2-meter Jake Ehrhardt rose in the ranks of all-time scoring for USC men’s water polo, now holding No. 14 with 148 career goals in total.
Freshman utility player Andrej Grgurevic has kicked off his first season on a high note, scoring 13 goals in 11 games. Last weekend alone Grgurevic scored five goals total; once per matchup against Fordham, UC Davis and UCLA and twice against Cal.
“It’s definitely a step up when you play them, like mentally and physically,” Grgurevic said about playing top four teams like UCLA and Cal.
As a freshman, Grgurevic is getting more action than most, and the competition is already heating up.
“Both UCLA and Cal are both very quick, strong, fast teams and always keeping up with them is a challenge,” Grgurevic said. “As a team it was definitely [defense]… I feel we did a very good job throughout most of the game, it was just a few slip ups that we had that cost us, in the end, two big wins.”
Pintaric agreed and emphasized the work that he is putting into improving the Trojans’ defensive strategy.
“We are allowing too many goals, and this is the work in progress that we have been facing and working on the most,” Pintaric said.
In addition to cracking down on defense, Pintaric is looking forward to opening up his offense in games this weekend and in future conference matches. The Trojans have officially finished their tournament play for the season and are now moving into conference matchups until December.
“We’re going to try to see if we can give more opportunities to other players,” Pintaric said. “We have 29 people on the roster, and we’ll see if there is a possibility and room to see other players in action,” Pintaric said.
The Trojans will head to Santa Barbara, Calif. to face No. 8 UCSB on Friday, and then return home for a matchup against No. 9 UC Irvine on Sunday.