By Christian Vieyra (@thecvieyra)– Spear Reporter | Photo by Clark Hwang | SJSU defenders swarm a LMU player.
SJSU men’s water polo fell 13-12 to Loyala Marymount University in a tightly contested match that dwindled down to the final seconds on Sunday at the Spartan Recreation and Aquatic Center.
With the score tied at 12-12, LMU’s Tommaso Baldineti scored the game winner with 1:59 left on the clock. SJSU would have multiple chances to tie the match, including a last second effort by senior Gal Haimovich, which an LMU defender deflected and never reached the goal as the final buzzer sounded.
Haimovich led the comeback from being down 12-10 for the Spartans in the final minutes despite missing the last shot.
This was the Spartans second loss to the Lions this season, they previously lost 17-12 on Sept. 23.
With one regular season conference game left, SJSU has its sights set on the upcoming West Coast Conference Championship tournament.
“It’s just a battle and we haven’t lost the fight yet,” associate head coach Gabor Sarusi said. “We are expecting to see them in the semifinal game or the final game of the conference championship in two weeks.”
Sarusi expects his team to be, “really fired up.” He claims they are confident they can beat any team in their conference, including LMU who they lost to twice this season.
The match was not without controversy as Sarusi believed the outcome could have been different.
“Some of the calls were interesting,” Sarusi said. “I thought they could have gone either way but we were losing a lot of 50/50 calls.”
Sophomore Mateja Bosić led the Spartans with four goals. Sophomore Maro Tiozzo and Haimovich were right behind Bosić with three each. Freshman goalkeeper Brendon Gyapjas had 12 saves.
SJSU will travel to Riverside to face its final regular season opponent Cal Baptist at 1 p.m. on Saturday.