Long Beach State University Athletics
Beach Water Polo With Three Home Matches This Week
10/13/2015 12:00:00 AM | Men's Water Polo
Long Beach, Calif. -
No. 8 Long Beach State will stay at home for the week, preparing for three matches. The first will be a double-header on Thursday, Oct. 15, as the 49ers will face Occidental College at 3 p.m. and UC San Diego at 7 p.m. The Beach will then face off against UC Santa Barbara on Saturday at noon before the alumni matches begin.
FACING THE TIGERS
LBSU's (5-9, 0-2 MPSF) home opener double-header begins with Occidental College (2-10), which will also be the two team's first meeting this season. Both teams last faced each other in the Inland Empire Classic in 2012 where the Beach dominated 22-7. That was the second-most goals scored for LBSU in that season, the first being a 23-7 win against Fresno Pacific later in the season.
Occidental's match with the 49ers will be the Tigers' last non-conference match before starting on Saturday against Pomona-Pitzer.
Junior attacker Paul Bergevin is the Tiger's leading scorer with 17 goals in the season. Bergevin had a season-high four goals in Occidental's first win against Penn State-Behrend at the Gary Troyer Tournament. Senior utility Henry Franscioni follows in goal scoring with 14.
SCOUTING THE TRITONS
The 49ers will then face No. 15 UC San Diego (9-9, 2-0 WWPA) for the second and last time in the regular season. The first meeting was an 11-6 win for the Beach to open the NorCal Tournament.
LBSU's veterans led the way in that match with senior Dimitrios Lappas scoring a hat trick and sophomores Jacob Fujioka and Lee Griffin scoring two goals each.
The Triton's senior Chase Cockerill leads the way for UCSD with 23 goals. He also has 10 assists and leads the team with 28 steals. Junior Nick Alexander is the second leading scorer with 17 goals. Alexander leads the team with 26 assists, and also has 16 steals.
Redshirt freshman Jack Turner leads the Tritons in saves with 97 in the season. Turner also recorded four assists and eight steals. Freshman Sam Thompson has seen some playing time having 13 saves and a steal so far in the season.
FIFTH TIME'S A CHARM
LBSU will have their fifth meeting of the season with No. 6 UCSB (11-6, 0-2 MPSF) this Saturday. The 49ers have lost all three official matches, but won one exhibition match against the Gauchos 11-8.
In the first two meetings with UCSB, the Beach lost by only one point. The last meeting in the SoCal Tournament, the 49ers were defeated 12-6.
Redshirt freshman Austin Stevenson has scored five goals against the Gauchos this season, including a hat trick in their last meeting. Lappas and redshirt freshman Chandler Kaltenbach have scored in every meeting against the Beach, Lappas with three goals against them and Chandler Kaltenbach with four.
STATS TO KNOW
Stevenson has jumped to tie with Lappas in the leading scorer position with 16 goals in the season after scoring a team-high six goals in the SoCal Tournament last weekend. Stevenson has had six multi-scoring games so far, the highest on the team.
Including Stevenson, there are now six players scoring in double digits for the 49ers. Freshman Keegan Wicken has 14 goals and Chandler Kaltenbach and sophomore Duncan Lynde have 13 goals. Sophomore transfer from Long Beach City College Lovro Miocevic has moved up to round out the group with 11 goals in the season after scoring four goals on the first day of the SoCal Tournament.
The Beach offense has decreased a little with a drop in the average now to 8.14 goals per game compared to 8.4 from last week. The offense has not changed, though, with the majority of the 49ers' goals coming in the second half - 31 goals in the third and 34 goals in the fourth. LBSU has scored 47 goals in the first two quarters.
Senior Pavo Ljepopio has played every minute for the Beach this season with 148 saves in 57.69 quarters (four OT periods and one minute of sudden victory). Ljepopio has an average of 10.28 saves per game. He has allowed 125 goals in the season and holds a GAA (Goals-Against Average) of 8.67, which he lowered by a tenth from last week.
LBSU has won their home openers three years in a row, and will look to make it a fourth this Thursday.
The alumni matches will begin after the men's match against UCSB. The women's alumni game starts at 1:30 p.m. and the men's at 3 p.m. Click here for more information on the alumni matches.
Following the alumni matches, the 49ers' regular season resumes with Whittier College on Thursday, Oct. 22.
Players Mentioned
