BOX SCORE

RIVERSIDE, Calif. – With seeding and Senior Day hanging in the balance, California Baptist University secured a 10-7 victory over Air Force in the final Western Water Polo Association game of the regular season on Saturday.

Superb defense over the final 24 minutes and the hot hand of Dominick Nevarez led the 12^th-ranked Lancers to the conference win. CBU improves to 21-10 this season and finished regular-season WWPA play with its best-ever 5-2 conference record, while the Falcons drop to 7-15, 3-4.

CBU's record ties with Loyola Marymount for the third best in the WWPA, but the Lions hold the tiebreaker over the Lancers. It will give CBU the fourth seed for the conference tournament in two weeks and means it will get a rematch with Air Force in the opening round of the conference tournament hosted by Fresno Pacific on Friday, Nov. 16.

On Senior Day, the Lancers celebrated their five seniors: Matt Miller, Kyle Christian, Royce Daniel Laverne, Ryan Sargis and Tanner Shore. While Christian was not dressed, the four others got into the action and were subbed out in the waning minutes of the game, which gave the crowd a chance to cheer on all the seniors.

"It's a special group for me because it's my first group for me, too," said Coach Kevin Rosa, who is in his fourth year at CBU. "These were some of the first guys I recruited and signed. It's fun to have so much success with them. Tanner's defense really solidified that third quarter for us with his work on his side of the pool."

Shore had four steals, two assists and a goal in the game, while Sargis added two assists, drew three ejections and had two steals. Logan Mena, a junior, also scored twice and had three drawn ejections.

Meanwhile, Nevarez scored five of CBU's 10 goals and assisted on another Saturday afternoon. The Lancers' defense also locked in after Air Force took 3-1 lead with 1:28 to play in the first quarter. The Falcons managed just four more goals over the final 25-and-a-half minutes.

"The effort was there. There was a little bit of a letdown in the first quarter," Rosa said. "We were able to maintain our composure and after that we played much better."

CBU held Air Force to a 13-minute scoreless drought that led to a 9-4 lead for the home team with 7:02 to play. Mena and Shore both scored in the first 1:05 of the second quarter to tie the game at 3-3.

Joseph Galgani and Nevarez scored the final two goals of the quarter, as well, to give the Lancers a 5-4 edge at half. CBU shutout Air Force entirely in the third, with Nevarez scoring twice in the quarter to make it 7-4 going into the fourth.

"In the second and third quarter, we gave up one goal total," Rosa said. "Other than that three-goal run in the first quarter, I thought the defense was outstanding. When we were able to shut their counterattack down we had pretty good half-court defense."

Nevarez would also score the first two goals of the fourth quarter to give the Lancers a commanding 9-4 lead with seven minutes left in regulation.

"When Dom is feeling it, you've got to give him the ball," Rosa said. "We were looking for cross passes to that side of the pool. I thought we were missing those and not shooting those in the first half. In the second half, we caught and shot."

Air Force cut the lead down to 9-6, but Mena powered home an important insurance goal from center off a pass from Sargis to make it 10-6 with 3:43 remaining.