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Photo by
Juan Velez.
Cerritos College Men's Water Polo shut
down Mt. SAC in the second half to secure
a 8-6 victory. |
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Unable to
generate any kind of consistent offensive attack
in the first half, the Cerritos College men's
water polo team turned to their defense to keep
close to Mt. San Antonio College in their South
Coast Conference match on Wednesday afternoon.
Trailing 6-4 at halftime, the Falcons outscored
the Mounties 4-0 in the second half and pulled
out an 8-6 win. For the Falcons, ranked #4 in
the state, they improved to 9-2 overall and 3-0
in SCC ply, while Mt. San Antonio, ranked #6,
dropped to 16-5.
"Our offense
in the first half was horrible," said head coach
Joe
Abing. "We were trying to force the
ball in and I was trying to explain to them that
we need to be patient and work the ball. They
worked out their problems in the second half and
our defense was great."
After falling
behind 4-1 in the second quarter, Cerritos
received a goal from sophomore
Ryan
Tamula (Cerritos HS) with
42 seconds left to get the team to within 4-2 by
halftime. The two teams traded goals two goals
each in the third quarter before the Falcons
scored all four goals in the fourth quarter for
the lead and win. Sophomore
Dan Biag
(Cerritos HS) got the team to within
6-5 with 7:43 remaining before sophomore
Mark
Zuniga (Downey HS) scored
off a steal just 47 seconds later to tie the
match.
A superb block
by sophomore goalkeeper
Josh
Del Toro (Pioneer HS)
sparked another Cerritos goal, as sophomore
Louie Espinoza (Montebello
HS) gave the Falcons their first lead of
the game with 5:58 left. Espinoza closed out the
scoring with his second tally with 3:10
remaining.
Defensively,
the Falcons received three steals from sophomore
Chris
Argueta (Cathedral HS),
while Espinoza, sophomore
Miguel Villalobos (Whittier HS)
and freshman
Cory
Baccus (Whittier HS) each
added two. Del Toro was great in goal in the
fourth quarter, as he made three saves without
allowing a goal, with sophomore
Ian
Pawlowski (La Serna HS)
posting four saves in the third quarter.
Cerritos will
now host Merced College on Thursday at 3:00 p.m.
in a none-conference match.
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