Best-Of-2018

A Look Back At 2018

| By: Stacey Shackleford
IRVINE, Calif. – As 2018 comes to a close, let's look back at some of the highlights from January to December.

JANUARY
Jan. 27 – When men's volleyball meets BYU it rarely disappoints, including this showdown between the sixth-ranked Anteaters and fifth-ranked Cougars. UCI took the match 3-2, winning 15-13 in the fifth set.

In the final stanza, back-to-back kills by Joel Schneidmiller gave UCI a healthy 10-6 lead, but BYU was able to rally and tie the set at 12-12. After each team scored a point, UCI recorded back-to-back blocks to end the match and capture the victory.

Schneidmiller put away a career and match-high 19 kills, hitting .424. Aaron Koubi was also stellar, hitting .538, posting a season-high 17 kills.
 
FEBRUARY
Feb. 15 – In a showdown between the league's second and third place teams, the women's basketball team handed Cal Poly a 107-66 defeat at the Bren Events Center.
 
The Anteaters' 107 points were the most they have scored in the NCAA Division I Championship era (since 1981-82), and tied an overall single-game record that was set against UC Santa Cruz back in 1979.

It was the first time in program history they have reached the century mark twice in one season as UCI beat Long Beach State 100-81 earlier in the month.
 
Feb. 23 – Pitcher Andre Pallante recorded 12 strikeouts over seven innings to claim a 3-1 victory over Gonzaga at Anteater Ballpark.
All three of UCI's runs came in the first inning.

MARCH
Mar. 6 – Women's golfer Avery French earned co-medalist honors at the Fresno State Classic at the Copper River Country Club.  She started the final day with three consecutive bogeys, but turned it around to shoot a tournament-low 69 on the final round and posted a score of 211 (70-72-69).

Mar. 8 & 9 – Men's basketball player Max Hazzard hit the game-winning jumper with seven seconds remaining to lift third-seeded UC Irvine to a 68-67 victory over sixth-seeded Hawai'i in a Big West Tournament quarterfinal game at the Honda Center.

With 4:08 left to play, UCI found its spark, going on a 14-2 run that erased a 10-point deficit, retaking the lead, 66-64 with 37 seconds on the clock. Hawai'I made a free throw after a foul was called with 14 seconds left in regulation, making it a 68-67 game. Eyassu Worku found Hazzard for a 10-foot jumper with seven ticks on the clock to send UCI into the semifinals.
 
Worku would be the hero the next night as he sunk the game-winning jumper with 45 seconds showing on the clock to give the Anteaters a 61-58 victory over UC Santa Barbara in a Big West Tournament semifinal.

Mar. 13 – The women's basketball team earned its second postseason berth in program history and first since 1995 being selected to the Women's Basketball Invitational.

The Anteaters finished the season with an 18-14 overall record. The 18 wins rank fourth in school history and are the most by a UCI squad since 1994-95. UCI saw a 12.5 game improvement from the year before, which tied for the second-best turnaround in all of NCAA Division I.

Mar. 24 – Freshman Seth Enochs won the long jump in each of his first three collegiate meets, including a personal-record 24-05.50 at the UCI Spring Break Collegiate Classic, putting him at No. 5 among the program's career leaders.
 
APRIL
Apr. 3 – The baseball team won 2-1 in 11 innings at San Diego. Catcher Matt Reitano filled in in the outfield and third base in front of friends and family. The San Diego native then launched a solo home run in the 11th as the game-winning homer.

Apr. 22 – The men's volleyball team was an at-large selection for the 2018 National Collegiate Men's Volleyball Championship. It was UCI's seventh trip to the NCAA post-season.

Apr. 29 - Women's Water polo player Cara Borkovec fired a shot in to the right corner of the cage for the game-winning goal in sudden-death overtime as UC Irvine won its second-straight Big West Championship title, 8-7, against Hawai'i.  It was the seventh Big West Championships title and second-straight for the Anteaters who earn an automatic bid to the NCAA Championships.

Goalkeeper Jenna Phreaner was named the Championship's Most Valuable Player.
 
MAY
May 1 - The seventh-seeded UC Irvine men's golf team pulled off an epic upset, defeating No. 1 seed UC Davis by one stroke to win the program's conference-leading eighth Big West Championship. The 'Eaters advanced to their 14th NCAA Regional, and Paul Smolinski collected his league-record ninth Big West Men's Golf Coach of the Year award.
 
May 5 – UC Irvine and Oregon played Saturday afternoon with the Ducks sprinting out to a 6-0 lead in the 2nd inning. The Anteaters chipped away to take an 8-7 lead in the 7th. Oregon scored twice in the 9th to snatch the lead back, but UCI countered with a run in the bottom half tying things up. In extra innings, the Anteaters pushed across the game-winning run  on a Christian Koss sacrifice fly in the 11th inning ending the 4-hour, 40-minute marathon with a 10-9 Anteater victory to win the series.

May 11-12 - After finishing as the runner-up in 2016 and 2017, senior Persis William-Mensah won her first career Big West individual title in the 100m. She was the third 'Eater in program history to be crowned the women's 100m conference champion, and first since 1996.
 
William-Mensah went on to establish school records of 11.48 in the 100m and 23.56 in the 200m at the NCAA West Preliminaries.
 
Barbara Coward opened the Big West Championship claiming the discus title at the Big West Championships. The junior had a mark of 167-07, 11-feet better than second place. Coward was the Anteaters' fourth Big West champion in the discus and first since 2014.
   
May 18 – Head Coach Mike Gillespie was honored before the game with a ceremony attended by Chancellor Gillman where Skip's number 19 was unveiled on the outfield wall as the second number in UC Irvine Athletics history to be retired joining men's basketball player Kevin Magee's #44. The 'Eaters would win the game, 12-2, over UC Riverside, and coach Gillespie would finish out his heralded career later that month as the 'Eaters' all-time winningest coach with 393 victories among a Hall of Fame career of 47 seasons, 31 on the Division I level, where he managed 2,461 games and tallied up 1,574 victories
 
May 20 – In head coach Mike Gillespie's final home game, the 'Eaters tussled with UC Riverside with the sides tied at 1-1 entering the 8th inning. UCI scored twice to take the lead, but the Highlanders answered with two in the top of the 9th tying things back up at 3-3. Mikey Filia would step up singling home the winning run in walk-off fashion in the bottom of the ninth to send coach Gillespie out with a win, 4-3.
 
JUNE
June 20 - Women's water polo player Allie Loomis was honored at the College World Series for winning the NCAA Elite 90 Award for the highest grade point average at an NCAA Championship. Loomis also earned the 2018 Big West Leadership Award.
 
AUGUST
Aug. 5 – The men's basketball team traveled to South Korea to participate in the 5th Asia-Pacific University Basketball Challenge. The Anteaters beat South Korea, Japan, Chinese Taipei before falling to Russia in the Championship game.

Aug. 25 - Freshman Abby Marjama tied the UC Irvine match record for aces with nine in a 3-1 victory over Saint Mary's in the finale of the Utah Volleyball Classic. Marjama's nine aces matched Tandie Wade's mark set against Nevada in 1996. The outside hitter was named Big West Freshman of the Year, the second Anteater to claim the honor, joining Kari Pestolesi who was crowned in 2007.

Aug. 29 – The men's volleyball team embarked on a three-country Asian Tour, playing the top professional teams in South Korea, China and Japan.

SEPTEMBER
Sep. 1 - Men's Water Polo opens up their season down in San Diego at the Triton Invitational. In their first match of the season, the Anteaters took on the #12 UCSD Tritons and in entertaining fashion Casey Lynton delivered the golden goal to secure a 12-11 Sudden Death Overtime victory for the Anteaters.

Sep. 2 – Men's soccer was in a hole losing a player to a red card in the 32nd minute of play. The opponent, James Madison, answered with a goal in the 52nd minute to make it 1-0. UCI would tie things up in the 62nd minute thanks to a Jose Ortiz set piece goal, and in the 104th minute, despite playing a man down to the Dukes, Alvaro Quezada and Jose Soto teamed up to place a ball near the far post that Ivan Canales would head home for the improbable come-from-behind 2-1 victory by the Anteaters.

Sept. 15 - In her first career 6000-meter race, freshman women's cross country runner Hannah Chau finished 14th out of 170 at the UC Riverside Invitational. Her time of 20:59.2 was the eighth-best in school history. She became the first Anteater to make her way into the program's 6K record book in seven years.

Sept. 21 – Women's soccer had two penalty kicks saved by goalkeeper Maddie Newsom as the Anteaters posted a comeback win in the 83rd minute at San Francisco, 3-2.
 
Sept. 28 – Women's soccer hosted Hawai'i in an ESPN3 televised match. Neither side found the back of the net through 90 minutes and the first overtime period. With the seconds counting down, Reema Bzeih jumped onto a ball in the box and pin-balled a shot off multiple defenders and in with one second remaining in double overtime to just claim the 1-0 victory to open Big West play.
 
OCTOBER
Oct. 5 – UC Irvine women's soccer followed up its dramatics against Hawai'i with more a week later hosting UC Santa Barbara. The sides were tied 1-1 heading into overtime, and in the second minute of double overtime, keeper Maddie Newsom launched a free kick into the box finding Kelsee Pottorff near the post to leap and head a ball by the keeper and deliver another double overtime victory, 2-1.

Oct. 6 – Women's tennis opened the 2018-19 season with four straight victories. Gillian Parker, Danielle Garrido and Flora Amiri each won their first five matches.

Oct. 7 – Women's soccer reached down for a third straight match to pull out a double overtime victory. This time, in a 1-1 deadlock with Cal Poly, Maddie Newsom launched another free kick into the box in the final minute of double overtime, and out of the mass of players, Shelby Lee's header found it and willed it inside the post and across the line serving up a 2-1 Anteater victory with 28 seconds remaining in the match.

Oct. 10 – Greg Patenaude had 10 saves in UCI men's soccer come-from-behind win over No. 25 UC Davis, 2-1.

Oct. 17 – Men's soccer went to overtime with Cal State Fullerton despite an Anteater goal 52 seconds into the match. In the 102nd minute, a free kick rocketed at the keeper, and Ivan Canales would put away a third rebound to lift UCI to a 2-1 victory.

Oct. 21 – Ivan Canales scored with two seconds left in double overtime to give UCI a 3-2 victory over Cal Poly and clinch a Big West title.

NOVEMBER
Nov. 9 - Men's basketball beat Texas A&M in College Station, TX on Eyassu Worku's game winning falling jumper, 74-73.
 
UCI shot 52.7 percent (29-55) from the field and held the Aggies to just 36.4 percent (24-66). Max Hazzard led the 'Eaters with 19 points, matching a then career-high five three-pointers. This was the first win over an SEC school since 2006 when UCI beat South Carolina 67-52.

Nov. 13 - Senior Andee Ritter made the game-winning layup with 3.1 seconds left in a 57-55 victory over UNLV. It was UCI's first win against the Lady Rebels in 24 years. It also kept the Anteaters' perfect start to the season intact as they were one of only 21 undefeated teams left in all of NCAA Division I at the time.
 
Nov. 15 – Men's soccer's return to the NCAA Tournament drew a challenging opponent in Grand Canyon. UCI found itself down 1-0 early in the second half, but in the 70th minute found a stroke of luck as Ateno Ajeakwa fired a shot into the box that hit a GCU defender and flipped up and over the keeper for the equalizing own goal. The sides battled through overtime without a decisive goal sending the match to a penalty kick shootout to be decided. UCI missed its first attempt, but keeper Greg Patenaude made a save in the second round to knot things back up. In the 7th round of the shootout, Patenaude rose up against stopping another shot to send UCI through to the second round of the NCAA Tournament.
 
 
DECEMBER
Dec. 18 - Behind a career-high 34 points from sophomore Jordan Sanders, the women's basketball team erased a double-digit deficit to defeat Portland State on the road, 73-68.  Sanders improved upon her career-high of 29 set the previous game. The 'Eaters improved to 9-1 on the year, while handing the Vikings their first loss (8-1).
 
Print Friendly Version