Women’s Water Polo: Team USA will play for gold
Two power-play goals from Maddie Musselman came in quick succession Wednesday for the U.S. Olympic women’s water polo team.
The former Corona del Mar High star scored twice in just more than a minute, first from the left wing and then from the right wing into the near corner. Musselman’s goals widened the U.S. lead to four goals, forcing opponent Hungary to burn a timeout.
Team USA wouldn’t look back in the Olympic semifinal game in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The Americans are one game away from defending their gold medal.
Newport Beach resident Maggie Steffens had a team-high four goals as Team USA beat Hungary, 14-10, to secure its place in the gold-medal match.
Former Newport Harbor High and USC star Kaleigh Gilchrist added a goal and two assists for the U.S., which will play Italy on Friday for the championship. The match is scheduled for 11:30 a.m. Pacific time and will air on NBC, as well as stream live at NBCOlympics.com and the NBC Sports app.
Team USA is undefeated in the tournament and has outscored its competition by a combined 61-27. The Americans have now won 11 straight Olympic matches overall.
“We were complete offensively and complete in terms of our effort,” U.S. Coach Adam Krikorian said in a release from USA Water Polo. “We didn’t lose focus, but I do think we could have done a better job defensively. We haven’t given up 10 goals in a long time. Hungary is a great offensive team so we knew it was going to be a challenge, but I wish we could have done a little better job defensively.”
Team USA, which features UC Irvine women’s water polo coach Dan Klatt and Corona del Mar High alumnus Chris Oeding as assistant coaches, improved to 5-0 in 2016 against Hungary. The U.S. actually trailed Hungary, 2-1, in the opening quarter Wednesday, its first deficit in the 2016 Olympics.
It was short-lived. Melissa Seidemann scored before Steffens added a power-play strike to give the U.S. a 3-2 lead after the first period.
Hungary pulled within 4-3 early in the second on a goal by Barbara Bujka, one of her two in the contest. But Courtney Mathewson responded with a goal for Team USA before Musselman’s two extra-player goals, the second of which gave the U.S. a 7-3 advantage with 4:16 remaining in the half. Gilchrist’s goal came on the next possession for Team USA, which took an 8-5 lead into halftime.
Hungary’s Rita Keszthelyi scored one of her team-high four goals early in the third quarter, trimming the lead to two. But Team USA responded with goals from Steffens and Kiley Neushul on back-to-back possessions to again extend the lead. Hungary wouldn’t get within four goals the rest of the way.
Steffens, the 2012 Olympics MVP and current team captain, leads Team USA players with 16 goals in the tournament. Musselman is second with 11 goals. Gilchrist has scored six times.
Gilchrist and Musselman took to social media to celebrate the win. On Facebook, Gilchrist posted a picture of a team huddle and wrote, “The smiles say it all! Going for GOLD. One more game!”
Musselman posted a picture of herself and her large personal cheering section, which includes her parents and her two sisters, Alex and Ella. “Fan club!!,” she wrote. “Can’t wait to have all them at our final game on Friday. GO USA!” She then added the hashtags, #GoForGold and #Olympics.
The U.S. will now prepare for Italy, a 12-9 winner over Russia in the other semifinal. Team USA has not been seriously challenged in the second half in Rio, but Krikorian does not expect his team to be complacent, especially with so much on the line.
“We could be playing dominoes back at the apartment and they would all want to beat me and beat each other,” Krikorian said. “This group hates to lose and that makes my job much easier. It’s as much of a mental challenge as it is a physical challenge. I’m fortunate to have an extremely competitive group.”
