STOCKTON, Calif. – For the second year in a row, the No. 8 Pacific men's water polo program won the West Coast Conference Regular Season Championship with a 14-11 victory over No. 12 Cal Baptist on Senior Day Sunday at the Eberhardt Aquatics Center.
Pacific (15-5, 5-1 WCC) never trailed CBU (21-9, 3-2 WCC) in the contest and captured its fourth championship in four seasons. The Tigers also secured the No. 1 seed for the 2025 conference tournament on Nov. 21-23, hosted by Air Force.
"The amount of improvement we've seen over the course of the year from such a young team has been remarkable. They've truly grown together, supported one another and learned what it takes to win games at this level," said head coach
James Graham. "To win at our home pool against the team that ended our season last year means a lot. I can't thank everyone enough who came out and supported us today and over the course of the season so far."
Pacific won its eighth consecutive game and third straight home match. The Tigers were picked to finish third in the WCC Preseason Poll.
"We knew coming into the season that we could beat teams that were picked above us, and this team played with a lot of confidence all year," said sophomore
Ori Buzaglo, who was also a part of last year's championship team. "We wanted to prove to everyone that we could do it with this group and I'm super proud of these guys. Winning this championship two years in a row is an incredible accomplishment."
The Tigers garnered hat tricks from Buzaglo, freshman
Petar Popovic, and freshman
Borisz Kasa-Gal. Senior
Daniel Viscia and sophomore
Yoav Rendler netted two goals apiece.
Freshman
Apostolos Georgaras, who earned both WCC Player and Newcomer of the Week honors on Monday, finished with a goal and four assists. Freshman goalkeeper
Kiss Gergely picked up the win with 11 saves and an assist.
The Tigers got out to an early 5-1 lead, which included a pair of goals by Viscia, and remained ahead 8-4 at the half. Pacific extended it to 12-6 late in the third on a goal by Popovic.
The Lancers attempted to rally late and came as close as 13-10 at the 4:39 mark, but Rendler sealed it with a goal with 2:33 left. Pacific successfully ran out the clock in the closing minutes.
The Tigers improved to 18-2 all-time against CBU.
After the match, Pacific honored 10 seniors in a special Senior Day ceremony. The group included Viscia,
Ethan Braga,
Nash Brandon,
Charlie Donlin,
Declan McJilton,
Alek Newman,
Filip Norell,
Manuel Pembertty,
Eli Sternweiler, and
Daniel Warman.
"Winning the conference is always a goal for us and I'm really happy we won the regular season, but our focus now is winning the conference tournament," said Viscia, who's been on the team the last five seasons. "This is a really close group of guys outside of the pool and we're more than just teammates – we're a family. I'm proud to be able to win with them but there's more we want to achieve this year."
Pacific continues the regular season Friday when it travels to No. 2 UCLA for a 5 p.m. match. The Tigers wrap up the regular season Sunday, Nov. 9, in a 1 p.m. road match at No. 3 Stanford.
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@UOPWaterPoloU), Instagram (
@pacificwaterpolo) and "like" the team's official Facebook page (
Pacific Men's Water Polo).
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