Glendale girls’ water polo back on track
ARCADIA — Stuck in a mini losing streak, the Glendale High girls’ water polo team looked to turn around their fortunes heading into their last regular-season Pacific League match Thursday afternoon.
With Biyouregh Boghozian and Maddie Corpuz leading the way, the Nitros got back on track and gained some momentum entering the league tournament having clinched no worse than a third-place seed.
Boghozian finished with five goals and Corpuz added three to spark Glendale to an 11-5 road win against Arcadia.
Glendale, ranked No. 10 in the latest CIF Southern Section Division V poll, improved to 10-10, 4-2 in league. The Nitros, who suffered back-to-back league losses against Burroughs and Crescenta Valley, have a bye next week before competing in the league tournament Feb. 5 and 7 at Burbank High.
“This was a super important game for us and one we had to win,” said Glendale Coach Forest Holbrook, who got two goals from Rima Gasparian and one from Naira Sarkian. “Our goal coming into league was a top-three finish and we got that accomplished.
“We heard that Arcadia has a good counter-attack and we knew that we had to stop that. We played a tight defensive press in the first half. In the second half, maybe we let our guard down a bit. Hopefully, that’s something we can learn from.”
Gasparian and Corpuz each scored a goal less than three minutes apart late in the first quarter to stake Glendale to a 2-0 advantage. Gasparian, Boghozian and Sarkian each had a goal in the second quarter to give Glendale a 5-0 halftime lead.
Boghozian said the Nitros defense excelled in shutting down the Apaches (1-4 in league) in the first half.
“It’s about playing good defense first and then offense,” said Boghozian, who scored three goals in less than five minutes in the third quarter to give the Nitros an 8-2 lead. “That’s usually worked out for us.
“I wasn’t making my shots at first. Then I started to shoot from the outside and the shots went in. It’s good to get a win. We came out confident. This was a good game to prepare [for the league tournament].”
Boghozian made it 9-2 with 6:15 left in the fourth quarter. Corpuz scored two goals in the final two minutes for the Nitros.
Arcadia received three goals from Laura Chun and one apiece from Christine Eskander and Nicole Sargent.
Glendale goalkeepers Shushanik Gabrielyan and Alenoush Aslanian each finished with three saves in the first and second halves, respectively.
Arcadia goalkeeper Heidi Tan registered 16 saves.
“We had a good shooting day,” Holbrook said.
