Girls Water Polo narrowly lost to Woodbridge in an extremely tense game this past Thursday, ending the game with a score of 4-5.
In the first half of the game, University was able to hold a strong advantage over Woodbridge, keeping a 3-1 lead over their team. However, in the third and fourth quarters, Woodbridge made a comeback, scoring four points to University’s one and snagging the victory.
“We ended up losing our game against Woodbridge 5-4. Woodbridge is a rival competitor to UNI, and they were pumped up in front of their home crowd. They were able to come back from our 3-1 lead at half time and we didn’t match their intensity” explained Coach Jesse Briggs, the head coach for Girl’s Water Polo.
Junior Sabine Salvucci attributes their loss to overconfidence in the first half of the game and the loss of morale in the second.
“For the first half of the game our team was up several points and we were all optimistic… but towards the end of the game, it felt like my team and I were becoming less motivated and we made several crucial mistakes… which eventually resulted to us losing by one point,” Salvucci said.
Historically, University has had mixed results when versing Woodbridge in years past. Last year, they won two of their three games against Woodbridge, with both last year and this year’s losses being extremely close.
Despite the loss, both players and Coach Briggs remain proud of their performance.
“It was a bit disappointing to break our winning streak but we put up a fight and it was a close game. We are working on fixing our defense for our future games and CIF,” Senior Angela Yan added.
As Water Polo approaches the conclusion of their season with an impressive overall score thus far of 11-5. making CIF playoffs a very real possibility.
“Our Uni girls have been training hard since Winter break, and we even doubled up on workouts this past week… We will be ready for our next match up against them in a few weeks when we see them at home,” Coach Briggs said.
Girls Water Polo looks forward to future success in their game against Beckman High School, taking place next Tuesday, January 5, at the University pool.