By Jessica Jimenez — Staff Writer
The San Jose State women’s water polo team fell Friday to UC Berkeley 18-9 in the quarter final round of the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Championships at Avery Aquatic Center at Stanford University.
Meeting the Bears for the third time this season, the Spartans (10-14, 2-4 MPSF) came out strong in the first quarter with junior driver Caroline Kerwin scoring the first goal within two and a half minutes into play.
Cal (16-6, 3-3 MPSF) struck the net multiple times with junior attacker Emma Wright scoring three out of the four goals for the Bears.
SJSU returned in the second quarter ready to tread on and it showed.
Sophomore 2-meter defender Tyanna Supreme hit the net 41 seconds in on a power play.
Cal Senior attacker Lauren Charter had an exclusion on a penalty foul that led SJSU freshman Olga Descalzi Portell to score on a penalty shot.
A minute later Descalzi Portell egg-beatered her way high on a power play and put the Spartans up on the board once again.
At the halftime mark the team felt excited and had their heads still in the game despite being down four goals.
“Our team never gives up and that is something that I absolutely love about this group, super resilient,” said junior driver Sierra Painter. “It doesn’t matter what the score is on the board we are just always going to go in hard.”
The second quarter ended with Supreme tossing in another goal and with junior 2-meter defender Jacqui Maisey throwing a forehand shot into the Cal net.
The Bears remained ahead for the game’s entirety with their lead-scorer of the day– Wright who successfully shoot cross-cage and made multiple forehand shots putting Cal on the board seven times.
SJSU went on to score three more goals between the third and fourth quarter with Painter striking the net with the last and final goal of the day.
Cal played hard against the Spartans dominated 18-9.
Head Coach Gabor Sarusi believes the team did a pretty good job although suffering a loss.
“It wasn’t the outcome we were hoping for but it was a really good effort,” said Sarusi. “They came out strong and we scored more goals this time then when we played the first game against them.”
SJSU will play their final game of the season against Indiana University or Arizona State University on Sunday at 11 a.m. at Avery Aquatic Center at Stanford University in the MPSF final round.
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