CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – The University of California, Merced men's water polo team (1-12) was defeated 9-7 by MIT and 20-4 by No. 19 Harvard on Saturday afternoon at the Harvard Invitational.
Match One | MIT 9, UC Merced 7
The Bobcats jumped out to a 3-1 lead six minutes into the match with two goals from Andrew Jones and one from Altug Misirli Jr. However, MIT responded with three straight goals of their own to end the quarter and take a 4-3 advantage.
Patrick Jones brought the Bobcats even 4-4 midway through the second quarter. After being held scoreless for more than four minutes, MIT found the back of the net on consecutive possessions to grab its first two-goal lead of the match at 6-4. The Engineers remained in front 6-4 at halftime.
MIT scored the game's only third quarter goal at the 6:13 mark, extending its lead to 7-4.
UC Merced got off to a hot start in the fourth quarter with Finn Moss scoring on the first possession and A. Jones and Noah Defaii giving the Bobcats a 3-0 goal scoring run with scores at the 4:22 and 3:56 mark, respectively. The run tied the game 7-7. Defensively, UC Merced held MIT scoreless for more than ten minutes of gametime. However, the Engineers eventually got back on the board and broke the tie with a goal with 3:39 left. MIT deposited another shot into the back of the net on its next possession and got defensive stops the rest of the way in the 9-7 victory.
Despite the Bobcats loss, A. Jones notched his eighth straight multi-goal game and his third hat trick of the season. Matthew Lloyd was in the cage for the Bobcats.
Match Two | Harvard 20, UC Merced 4
N0. 19 Harvard led 7-0 at the end of the first quarter and scored the game's first ten goals overall, leading 10-0 with 2:55 to go in the first half. Defaii snapped the Bobcats scoreless stretch with a goal at the 2:33 mark of the second quarter. Harvard led 11-1 at halftime.
The Crimson remained in rhythm in the third quarter and outscored the Bobcats 7-2 in the period. Evan Ladeairous registered both of the Bobcats goals.
Harvard tacked on two more goals in the fourth quarter, including its final goal with 3:40 on the clock to go up 20-3. P. Jones scored the final goal of the game for the Bobcats at the 3:25 mark.
Matthew Lloyd played the first half in cage for the Bobcats, while Ethan Stocker got the nod for the second half.
Up next, UC Merced will play LIU (7:00am PST) and Brown (1:00pm PST) at the Harvard Invitational on Sunday, October 18. Both matches will be played inside the Katherine Moran Coleman Aquatics Center on the campus of Brown in Providence, R.I.
