NCAA Water Polo Championships : Eastern Schools Fail Again as UCI Sails Past Brown

OK. So UC Irvine beat Brown University, 15-8, Friday night in the first round of the NCAA water polo championships at Belmont Plaza Pool.

And yeah, Irvine Coach Ted Newland did start putting his reserves in the match midway through the third quarter. The Anteaters led 9-3 at the half.

But don’t be misled. There was a tense moment in this match. It lasted exactly 55 seconds. That was the time between Brown taking a 1-0 lead on a goal by Tylden Shaeffer, until UCI’s Jeff Campbell tied the match with 5:07 left in the first quarter.

The Anteaters, seeded second, took a 3-1 lead after the first period and outscored the Bruins, seeded seventh, 6-2 in the second period.

“It was nice to have an easy game for once,” Newland said.

The Anteaters have been involved in five overtime matches this season, two against UCLA, their opponent in the semifinals at 7:30 tonight.

With UCI beating Brown, UCLA beating Loyola-Chicago, 14-6, and Stanford beating Bucknell, 18-4, eastern schools were once again shut out of the semifinals.

“An eastern school has never made it to the final four,” Campbell said. “We didn’t want to be the team that let one in . . . Brown actually has a very good team. They lost to USC by just a goal last year in the first round. But they lost a lot of seniors off that team.”

A quick look at their match results shows the Bruins don’t play the most demanding schedule. Exeter? Loomis? What next Slippery Rock?

Oh, sorry. Bucknell beat Slippery Rock, 12-4.

“A lot of the guys on those teams are from California,” Campbell said. “They’re good players. But they have a big disadvantage because they don’t play out there during the summer.”

UCI’s J.R. Salvatore scored three goals in the first half, all coming off fast breaks created by goalie Mark Maizel. Maizel had nine saves in the first half, and did a nice Wes Unseld imitation, lofting deep outlet passes to Salvatore and Tony Bell, who applied constant pressure on the Bruins’ defense.

“Mark does a great job in the goal and he’s a great passer,” Newland said. “But there’s no way he’ll be able to do that against UCLA. They’re just too good.”

Newland said the most important thing the win gave the Anteaters was rest.

“Because of all the close games we’ve had this year I haven’t had a chance to rest them much,” Newland said. “This is good, especially right before UCLA. They’re going to need all the rest they can get.”

Campbell, who left the match in the third period: “I haven’t sat out a whole fourth quarter for a long time. This was great.”

Campbell, Salvatore and Greg Wilson led the Anteaters with four goals each.

Shaeffer and Andrew Coon each had two goals to lead Brown.

In the other semifinal match, No. 1 seed Stanford will play No. 5 UC Santa Barbara, a 7-6 winner over No. 4 Cal State Long Beach, at 6 p.m. The 49ers will play Bucknell in the losers bracket at 3 p.m. Brown plays Loyola-Chicago at 4:30.