Men's Water Polo goes 2-2 on opening weekend
The Keelhaulers came out of the gate strong on day one of the 2019 season, before running into some tougher competition on day two for a .500 start to the year.
Cal Maritime broke out to a 5-1 lead over UC Santa Cruz in the first quarter of game one and were up 7-2 at the half. After tacking on four more goals in the third quarter and leading 11-4, the Keelhaulers got some of the many underclassmen on the 26-player roster. The Banana Slugs got three more goals before the Keelhaulers held on for an 11-7 victory.
Levi Devries led the Keelhaulers with four goals and Reagan Hesse scored twice to lead the Keelhaulers.
Game two Cal Maritime stormed out of the gate even harder against San Jose State and led 8-1 after the first half. The Spartans would make the final score closer in the fourth quarter much like the Banana Slugs did, but by then the Keelhaulers were too far ahead to be caught for a 13-6 win.
Again, Devries and Hesse led the way in scoring with Devries scoring three times and Hesse twice.
On day two Cal Maritime played perhaps the most spirited match of the entire weekend against rival Chico State. In an extremely physical match, the Keelhaulers led 3-2 after one quarter of play with goals from Hese, Cooper Arnett, Ian Iverson, though a goal by Player-Coach Aldric Terral with under 20 seconds left in the quarter was waved off.
But the Keelhaulers found themselves trailing 6-5 at the half as the Wildcats grabbed momentum and frustrate the home team. Things would only get worse in the third quarter as Chico State played the passing and shooting lanes well, which led to Cal Maritime taking tougher shots and created opportunities in the other direction for Chico State.
Cal Maritime would have opportunities to score in the second half but couldn't cash in, and Chico State committed slightly less mistakes and penalties than the Keelhaulers in a 13-9 loss with a large contingent of Wildcat fans in attendance.
The Wildcats played more like a boa constrictor, slowly tightening their grip on the Keelhaulers and squeezing the life out of their game. Hesse would score four goals to lead Cal Maritime, Iverson would tack one more goal to finish with two and Brandon Korolov would finish with two goals.
In the final match of the weekend Cal Maritime took on UC Davis, and they found themselves trailing 4-3 after one quarter and 8-4 at the half. The deficit would grow as large as five at two different points in the third quarter including an 11-6 deficit with 3:48 remaining in the third.
But from there the Keelhaulers would storm all the way back to cut it to a one-goal lead for the Aggies. Three exclusions for UC Davis created man-advantage opportunities for Cal Maritime and they would score four unanswered goals to cut it to 11-10 with 52 seconds left in the third on an Arnett goal.
Unfortunately, the Keelhaulers couldn't find the back of the net in the fourth quarter where things would get chippie. Red cards were issued to two UC Davis players and to Cal Maritime's Hess. The Aggies were able to spread out their formation over the final two minutes, and after scoring a goal in the first minute of the quarter they tacked on one more with under two minutes to play to hang on for a 13-10 defeat of Cal Maritime.
Korolov, Hesse, Terral, and Jay Morris each scored two goals in the final match for Cal Maritime.
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