UCLA Tops Massachusetts, Faces Stanford in Final

Too much speed. Too much experience.

That seemed to be the order of the day as top-seeded UCLA easily handled Massachusetts, 14-6, in an NCAA men’s water polo semifinal at UC San Diego.

UCLA (21-3), seeking its sixth national championship, will play eight-time champion Stanford (22-5) in the title game today at 1:30 p.m. Massachusetts and UC San Diego will play for third at noon.

Second-seeded Stanford, led by Jonathan Skaalen with two goals, defeated UC San Diego, 11-7.

Although fourth-seeded Massachusetts (28-6) desperately tried to hang on, it was no match for the Bruins’ counterattacks, which kept the Minutemen scrambling to get back on defense.

“Conditioning is a big part of the game,” said the Bruins’ Sean Kern, an All-Mountain Pacific Sports Federation selection who led his team with four goals. “We seemed to have the speed and the experience.”

UCLA built a 7-2 halftime lead on the strength of goals by Adam Wright, Matt Armato, Dave Parker and Jeff Pflueger and three by Kern, including what proved to be the game winner.

The Bruins, however, had a lapse in the third quarter, playing a sloppy seven minutes that resulted in a Minutemen goal by Brook O’Neil and the Bruins being unable to score in three man-advantage situations.

UCLA got back on track in the fourth quarter with goals by Kern, Andrew Bailey, Wright, Blake Wellen, Brian Brown and Samuel Bailey, who rounded out the scoring with a two-point goal with 46 seconds left.

In all, nine Bruins scored.

“It’s always nice to have balanced scoring,” UCLA Coach Guy Baker said. “And it was great to see Dave Parker score. He’s a five-year senior who works his butt off but doesn’t get to play that much.”

Stanford trailed San Diego, 5-4, at halftime but scored six goals in the third quarter to seize control.

Brian Heifferon, the MPSF player of the year, also had two goals for the Cardinal.