It’s rivalry week for the Trojans as No. 3 USC visits No. 1 UCLA in its first of two scheduled games against the Bruins. The match will be the 148th meeting between the two, with USC leading the series 78-68-1.

USC (10-4, 0-3 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation) is coming off a disappointing trip north, falling to No. 5 Stanford (10-5, 1-2 MPSF) and No. 2 UC Berkeley (13-2, 2-1 MPSF) over the weekend. In both matches, USC lost by one goal. Contrarily, UCLA (17-0, 3-0 MPSF) remains unbeaten and heads into the match atop the varsity polls with wins over both Cal and Stanford from that same weekend. 

“We lost both games, so for us, we didn’t achieve our goals,” fifth-year Head Coach Marko Pintaric said in an interview with the Daily Trojan. “But there was more than a couple of good things the team did [that] we’re going to apply, especially defensively.”

Over the weekend, USC took Stanford to overtime for the second time this season before ultimately falling to the Cardinal 14-13. In UCLA’s matchup, the Bruins handled Stanford 11-7. 

In the team’s home opener rematch versus Cal, despite improvement from its first outing against the Golden Bears, USC squandered a 7-4 halftime lead before falling 10-9. UCLA handed Cal its second loss of the season, 14-11, in a rematch of this year’s Overnght Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Invitational final.

Senior driver Carson Kranz led the Trojans with five goals last weekend, posting a hat trick in the match versus Cal. For UCLA, graduate attacker Rafael Real Vergara’s four goals in UCLA’s match against Cal led all Bruins. Vergara has made waves in Westwood since his arrival to the program as a transfer from CSU, Long Beach. He leads both UCLA and all NCAA players in goals this season with 41. 

“[Vergara’s] a great player. We already knew that,” Pintaric said. “With UCLA, he obviously fell into a great role for him, so we’ll be on him with extra caution [to] stop his shooting, stop his offensive drives and try to control his presence.”

For the Trojan defense, redshirt freshman goalkeeper Bernardo Herzer started in goal over the weekend after splitting time with redshirt sophomore goalkeeper Eric Hubner throughout the season. Against Cal and Stanford, Herzer tallied 17 saves.

For UCLA, senior goalkeeper Garret Griggs has been the backbone of the Bruin’s defense. Against Cal and Stanford, Griggs picked up 25 saves and has tallied 125 through 17 games. 

Heading into its matchup against UCLA, USC will look to avenge its 14-10 loss to the Bruins during the Overnight Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Invitational semifinals. Both Kranz and graduate driver Massimo Di Martire had hat tricks in that game. On the opposite side of the deck, Vergara had a team-high seven goals in the victory. 

“There’s still a work in progress,” Pintaric said. “We’re still learning from that match, especially with the matchups. We’ve got to make our adjustments, to really balance our rotations, [and] balance our personnel.”

Reflecting on the long-standing rivalry between the Trojans and Bruins and the larger NCAA implications Saturday’s match holds, Pintaric highlighted the atmosphere on deck going into the week.

“USC [and] UCLA, that’s a great rivalry,” Pintaric said. “You always go into these games with that frame of mind. It’s a game that can get you closer to the final goal to make it to the NCAA tournament. It’s one of those higher-level league games that we anticipate for the whole year.”

The Trojans will face UCLA Saturday at 1 p.m. at Spieker Aquatics Center.