Women's Water Polo Back Home vs. No. 20 San Diego State

Sunday, March 20

Irvine, Calif.

12:00 PM

UC Irvine

San Diego State

Photo by: Matt Brown

Women's Water Polo Back Home vs. No. 20 San Diego State

March 18, 2022 | Women's Water Polo

By: Alex Roberts-Croteau

					This Week in UC Irvine Women's Water Polo
Dates				March 20, 2022
Location				Anteater Aquatics Complex - Irvine, Calif.
Times				Sunday - 12:00 PM #20 San Diego State Aztecs UC Irvine Live Stream Live Stats
Opponent
Live Stream
Live Stats
Match Notes				UC Irvine Women's Water Polo Notes
Social Media				@UCIwwp @UCIwwp UC Irvine Women's Water Polo #RipEm #TogetherWeZot

STORYLINES
· UCI remain sixth in the nation after being ranked seventh all season entering March. The Anteaters upset No. 6 Michigan at the Kalbus Invite and went 3-1 to finish fifth, but dropped its last match at No. 2 UCLA for its first road loss.
· The Anteaters are now 2-0 in Big West Play winning at No. 16 UCSB by eight goals and at No. 24 CSUN by 14 goals. Big West preseason polls selected the 'Eaters to finish first. Conference play returns March 25 at Long Beach State.
· Tara Prentice leads the team with 42 goals. She became the sixth Anteater with 200 career goals during the Kalbus Invite and surpassed Erica Horman and Mary Brooks all-time for third place with 210 in her career. Next on the list is Robyn Kaake seven ahead of Prentice, and she's just 14 away from the program all-time scoring leader, Jessy Cardey. Her six-goal game at LMU was her career high at UCI, and she added five goals at UC Santa Barbara for six career games with at least five goals. Prentice also leads the squad in steals with 18 and exclusions drawn with 51 of the team's 114 recorded exclusions drawn this season.
· Sarah Nichols is UCI's assist leader with 16. She also posted UCI's first game of 2022 with two field blocks recorded in the win over Long Beach State, and leads all 'Eaters with five this season.
· Keeper Faith Tedesco has made all 18 starts with a 13-5 record. She has 118 saves with a high of 15 in a match this season against Fresno State. Tedesco has posted an 8.44 goals-against-average this season and for her career.
· Piper Smith netted her 100th career goal vs. Azusa Pacific. Smith is the 17th Anteater with 100 career goals. She's also the leading sprinter winning 12 of 17 sprints and has won 67% of her sprints, 67 wins in total over her career
· Upcoming milestones for 'Eaters are Tara Prentice who will play her 100th career match Sunday. Jessica Lynch blew by 100 career points with her four at UCLA now with 102 in her career behind 69 goals and 33 assists.
· The Anteaters finished fifth at the UCSD Triton Invite and Kalbus Invite at UCI winning three of four matches at each. UCI also won two of four matches to open the season at the ASU Cross Conference Challenge in Tempe.
· Schedule changes were announced for games at Cal, now April 2 at 12:30 p.m., and the April 2 match at Cal State East Bay has now been shifted to a 5:00 p.m. start.

ANTEATER ACCOLADES
· Anteaters have won Big West Player of the Week five times between two players. Tara Prentice won her fourth of the year, third straight, and seventh in her career this week all setting Big West records. Nioka Thomas drew the fifth Anteater award and the first of her career giving UCI five of the seven Big West awards in 2022.
· Big West Commissioner's Honor Roll was announced for student-athletes over 3.00 GPA in 2021 with 18 women's water polo players. Jensine Bugelli, Kira Hoffman, Tara Prentice, Kili Skibby, and Rylee Williams were recognized highest honors and Brooke Banta, Ariana Bockstahler, Elena Flynn, Jordan Frost, Jessica Lynch, Maeve Murphy, Jessica Newell, Sarah Nichols, Isabel Rack, Portia Schiavone, Mica Schiavone, Piper Smith, and Faith Tedesco with honors. This builds off the 12 players among the 113 Anteaters on fall Dean's List.
· In the pool, three were named ACWPC All-Americans including graduates Morgan Jones and Megan Falcon, and a lone returner in Piper Smith on the Second Team who led the squad in scoring with 26 goals.
· Three-time All-American Tara Prentice returns after sitting out the 2021 season to train of the 2021 Olympics. Prentice entered the season with 168 career goals and passed 200 for his career so far.

SUNDAY AT SAN DIEGO STATE
· UCI's first home match in a while happens Sunday against No. 20 San Diego State. The programs met twice last season at SDSU with UCI winning each by scores of 14-6 and 9-6. All-time, UCI is down in the series, 17-22, to the Aztecs, but have one 11 in a row and the last nine at home including the last home matchup which was the final home game of 2020 before the pandemic.
· The Aztecs are hanging around ranked No. 20 this year with a record of 7-9. SDSU struggled early with one-goal losses to LMU and CSUN at the Triton Invite and finished 14th at the Kalbus Invite just edging Pomona-Pitzer, 9-6. They have rolled of late winning six of seven including five of six at home invites over schools like CSUN Saint Francis, Bucknell, and a sudden-victory win over Princeton. Their match Wednesday with Harvard was canceled, and will play at LMU Saturday prior to heading to UCI.
· The scoring crew for the Aztecs is headed by senior Karli Canale (19 G), freshman Rose Kanemy (18 G, 11 A), sophomore Laurene Padilla (16 G), and senior Spencer Samuel (11 G). Kanemy has a team-high five goals in a game coming against CSUN. Goalies Raquel de Pinho and Zoe Morgan have split time in net with de Pinho making nine starts and a game-high 11 saves vs. Stanford. The Aztecs also feature Lucia Carballo, sister of Anteater men's water polo alum, Pablo Carballo.