Laguna Beach native makes most of chance with U.S. women’s water polo
Tennis legend Billie Jean King always said that “pressure is a privilege.”
Playing in King’s hometown of Long Beach, Laguna Beach native Emma Lineback easily could have felt that pressure this week.
Lineback, a left-hander who is now a sophomore at UCLA, made her debut with the U.S. women’s water polo senior national team in a four-match exhibition series against Italy and Spain.
“I think there’s always nerves,” said Lineback, who turned 19 last month. “Nerves are a good thing. It means you care. It’s just how you handle those nerves. I personally just try to say, ‘I’m nervous, I’m aware of it, but I’m not going to let it affect me negatively.’”
Lineback’s play was a positive for Team USA on Wednesday in the series finale. She scored Team USA’s first goal on the power play, and added an assist in an 11-10 win at Long Beach City College.
The U.S. finished 3-1 in the four-match series, earning a 16-13 win over Italy on Sunday before losing to Spain 9-5 on Monday. But the Americans rebounded for a 15-10 win over Italy on Tuesday before Wednesday’s victory.
Lineback played in three of the four matches, totaling four goals, an assist and a field block. There was familiarity there, as she has played with Maddie Musselman and Ava Johnson at UCLA and Team USA’s assistant coach was former Breakers coach Ethan Damato.
Musselman, the former Corona del Mar High and UCLA standout, was the Olympics MVP in Tokyo in 2021 and won her second gold medal. She did not play in the series as she is rehabbing a hip injury and in a pre-physician assistant program at Temple University this school year, but she was on the bench.
“I just came into this wanting to maximize the opportunity,” said Lineback, who scored 40 goals as a freshman last year at UCLA, second on the Bruins to only Musselman. “There’s so much to learn. Everybody kind of plays water polo a little bit differently, has their own style, so it’s really to come here and see what I bring to the table versus what somebody else brings to the table. I get to learn new techniques, new skills and variations of ways to do things. There’s a lot to learn from the veterans like [team captain] Rachel [Fattal].”
She gave credit to Johnson for helping open her up on her cross-cage power-play strike in the first quarter, which came after Spain had quickly opened up a 2-0 lead.
“What people don’t see is that Ava is on the three-post, and she’s completely occupying her defender,” Lineback said. “Everybody always sees who scores, but you don’t see what made that happen. I think that’s really cool here, no one person is more important and we recognize those small things that lead up to the big things.”
Fattal, a former Los Alamitos High and UCLA standout, was one of seven goal-scorers Wednesday for Team USA. In fact, the first seven goals were each scored by a different player.
Jewel Roemer and Jenna Flynn ended up leading the way with three goals each. Goalkeeper Ashleigh Johnson, like Fattal and Musselman a two-time Olympic gold medalist, had nine saves and a steal.
Roemer scored the match-winning goal, burying the near-side power-play shot with 1:35 left in the fourth quarter after a cross pass from Flynn. It was Team USA’s first lead of the match.
Judith Forca led Spain with four goals.
“It’s obviously always wonderful to finish a series or a bunch of games on a win, right?” Fattal said after the final whistle. “We had somewhat of a slow start in the game, but we definitely got it together and started playing a lot better toward the end. Spain is a really good team, and we’re lucky to be able to play against them here at home, because we play against them often overseas and at big tournaments. It’s a big win for us, and something we can draw a lot of confidence off of.”
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