'Eaters Top Waves, 12-9, at NorCal Invitational
September 20, 2015 | Men's Water Polo
STANFORD, Calif. --- Junior Lovre Milos and sophomore Ryan Warde scored three goals each to lead UC Irvine over Pepperdine, 12-9, in the seventh-place game of the Kap7 NorCal Invitational at Stanford's Avery Pool Sunday afternoon.
Senior Pablo Carballo added a pair of goals for the 'Eaters, who improved to 7-2 on the season.
Back-to-back goals in the first quarter from Milos at the 2:36 and 2:03 marks, respectively, gave UCI a 3-2 lead. Brendan Duffy's goal with 29 seconds left in the period extended the lead to 4-2 before a late Pepperdine score closed the gap to one.
Marko Asic's goal with 5:15 remaining in the second quarter pulled the Waves even at 4-4 before UCI scores from Milos (3:25) and Larson Pfeil (2:07) put the 'Eaters up 6-4 at halftime.
UCI took an 8-4 lead in the third quarter on goals by Carballo (4:37) and Matt Skinner (3:39).
Pepperdine's Mark Urban scored with 3:07 left in the quarter to make it 8-5 before Warde countered at 2:18 to extend UCI's lead to 9-5.
Urban (:42) and Carballo (:08) traded goals to put the 'Eaters up 10-6 entering the fourth quarter.
Following an early goal by the Waves, Warde scored at the 5:57 and 2:14 marks to increase UCI's lead to 12-7 and help seal the victory.
Urban led Pepperdine (4-4) with three goals in the game.
"We had a short two-hour break after our overtime game against Long Beach State, but we stayed strong and held our composure to execute well," UCI head coach Marc Hunt said.
"Lovre and Trush opened up with early goals and the team played tough defense to push for the win.
"Skinner, Pablo and Larson added some strong defense to maintain our lead and Warde hit some big shots late to close it out," Hunt added.
The 'Eaters are now idle from competition until the home opener Oct. 1 when UCI hosts UC San Diego at 7:00 p.m. at the Anteater Aquatics Complex.
Pepperdine 3-1-2-3 --- 9
UC Irvine 4-2-4-2 --- 12
Pep: Mark Urban 3, Marko Asic 2, Wesley Sherburne, Artak Arzumanyan, Robert Beck, Luke Hewko.
UCI: Lovre Milos 3, Ryan Warde 3, Pablo Carballo 2, Kyle Trush, Brendan Duffy, Larson Pfeil, Matt Skinner.
Saves: Zack Rhodes (Pep) 6; Dylan Peterson (UCI) 13.
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