UC DAVIS BOX SCORE

REDLANDS BOX SCORE

RIVERSIDE, Calif. – Balanced offense continued to be a defining characteristic of California Baptist University in two games on Saturday. Eleven different players scored a total of 24 goals on the day, with nine Lancers scoring and five notching multiple goals in a 14-10 win over Redlands in the evening. Fifteenth-ranked CBU battled and hung right with eighth-ranked UC Davis in a 12-10 loss in its home and Western Water Polo Association opener earlier in the day. 

UC Davis improves to 7-3, 1-0 in WWPA in its conference opener and Redlands drops to 3-9, while the Lancers remain .500 at 7-7 this year and open WWPA action 0-1.

CBU stays in Riverside next week, as it will host the Lancer Joust on Friday and Saturday. The Lancers will open the weekend against second-ranked USC at noon on Friday, and also face Mercyhurst, Concordia (in a non-conference tilt) and Riverside City College in a B-squad game over the two-day span.

Dominick Nevarez led CBU with nine points over both games, with five goals and four assists, along with three steals on Saturday. Zach Lowery had himself a day, too, with four goals, four assists and two steals to his credit.

Lowery amassed two goals, assists and steals versus the Bulldogs, which also saw Nevarez go off for two goals and two assists. Kyle Johnson, Logan Mena (two drawn ejections, assists) and Christian Britton all scored twice in the win, as well.

The Lancers unleashed on Redlands in the first quarter and built up a 7-1 lead by the end of the opening eight minutes. Nevarez scored twice in the run, while Johnson, Britton, Mena, Ryan Sargis and PJ McDonough all added to it.

Joseph Galgani increased the advantage to 8-1 with a goal 31 seconds into the second quarter off a Riley Bumgardner assist. Redlands managed to cut its deficit down to 9-5, but two goals from Lowery and one each from Britton and Bumgardner helped CBU move back in front by seven, 13-6, for plenty of insurance with 6:14 to play, before sealing the 14-10 victory for good.

Earlier in the day, no deficit was too great for the Lancers against the two-time reigning WWPA champion Aggies. UC Davis' two-goal win continued a recent run of tight games between the two conference rivals.

Nevarez led CBU with three goals, two assists and two steals versus UC Davis. Lowery added two goals and two assists, while Mena had a goal and three drawn ejections.

Coach Kevin Rosa liked what he saw from the offense against a stout UC Davis defense, which is allowing just 7.8 goals a game to teams outside of the top-10 rankings this year.

"Their defense was pretty solid, but we never got frustrated, and we drew some exclusions," said Rosa, whose team drew 12 ejections and a penalty shot in the contest. "We've won some games where we haven't scored 10 goals this year, so if we can tighten up our defense we will be in a good position." 

The last five games in the series with UC Davis have been decided by an average of 2.6 goals. Two of those wins were decided by one goal in the 2016 and 2015 WWPA Championship semifinals for the Aggies, who advanced to the NCAA Championship round last season as one of the last six teams left standing in 2017.

It was difficult for UC Davis or CBU to establish much of a rhythm, though, with a total of 28 exclusions/penalties called in the game. The real difference came down to UC Davis' 5-1 advantage in five-meter penalty shots. The Aggies scored four of them, which was enough for them to secure the two-goal win.

"That's UC Davis, they work for position," Rosa said of the penalties. "We need to be a little bit quicker in terms of positioning. They put themselves in position to make plays, and we needed to work harder to not give them that position."

Like it has all season, the 15^th-ranked Lancers showed a propensity to comeback no matter the deficit. The Aggies held a 3-1 lead at the end of the first quarter, but Lowery scored CBU's first two goals to narrow the deficit to 3-2 about 1:15 into the second quarter.

UC Davis stretched its advantage back out to three, 5-2, with 1:46 to play, but the Lancers rattled off two goals in the final minute of the first half to make it a one-goal deficit at halftime. CBU scored its first goal on a six-on-four opportunity after two Aggies were excluded in transition.

The ball worked its way around to Mena right outside of two-meters, and he rose up, took the pass and skipped it into the top corner. An offensive foul put the Lancers right back on the counter attack, and Lowery drew a penalty on the possession, allowing Nevarez to finish it to make it a 5-4 game.

"We definitely never quit," Rosa said. "They were up early in the first quarter, but I thought we hung in there and worked hard the entire time."

The Aggies came out strong in the second half and took their largest lead of the game, 11-6, with eight seconds left in the third quarter. A last-second goal in the frame from Johnson, which came on a rebound of a shot from Lowery gave CBU some momentum going into the fourth, despite an 11-7 deficit.

Nevarez scored an even-strength goal 36 seconds into the final quarter to make it a three-goal game. UC Davis answered right back, but Bumgardner made it a 12-9 with 3:22 to play. The true freshman drew an ordinary foul with the shot clock winding down, and then scored an impressive skip shot from about seven meters out.

CBU managed to cut its deficit down to 12-10 with 38 seconds left, as Kyle Rasmussen scored on an empty cage after the Lancer defense stripped the Aggie goalie of the ball. It was too late for a full comeback, as UC Davis let the clock run out from there.