DAVIS, Calif. — A blazing start powered the top-seeded and second-ranked University of Hawai'i women's water polo team to a 17-10 victory over UC San Diego in the semifinals of the Big West Championship on Saturday at the Schaal Aquatics Center in Davis, Calif.
The Rainbow Wahine (21-3) converted on nine of their first 11 shots with seven players contributing to the scoring on their way to advancing to the Big West final for the sixth straight year.
The 'Bows will face third-seeded Long Beach State at noon Pacific Time (9 a.m. Hawaii time) on Sunday in the championship game with the conference's automatic berth in the NCAA Women's Water Polo Championship at stake.
Lot Stertefeld posted her fifth hat trick of the season and fellow senior
Lucia Gomez de la Puente completed her eighth — and second of the tournament — to lead a group of seven Rainbow Wahine who scored at least two goals in UH's ninth straight victory. Stertefeld and Gomez de la Puente also assisted on three goals each.
Bia Mantellato Dias scored twice and drew three exclusions and UH went 9-for-12 on power-play opportunities for the game. Goalkeeper
Daisy Logtens stifled the Tritons through the first half and finished with nine saves and three steals in 3½ quarters before
Emma Gurasich closed out the game.
"I'm really proud of the way our team came out, they were on fire," UH coach
Maureen Cole said. "We put the ball away early and played really well defensively. And then all the credit in the world to UCSD. They just kept on fighting, got us really uncomfortable and went on a big run in the third quarter for a bit, and just proud of our team for getting it under control and coming away with the win."
No. 4-seed and 15th-ranked UC San Diego closed its season at 18-12.
Five different UH players scored in the first quarter and Logtens denied all four UCSD shots and the Rainbow Wahine opened up a 5-0 lead through the first eight minutes.
After UH's first shot went off the crossbar, the 'Bows scored on their next four possessions to take command early. UH struck first for the ninth straight game when
Alba Bonamusa Boix converted on the first power play of the game.
Bernadette Doyle lobbed in another goal and Gomez de la Puente hammered in a goal to give UH a 3-0 lead less than three minutes into the game. UH went 3-for-3 on power plays with
Agatha Weston and
Jordan Wedderburn also converting in the opening period.
Stertefeld, Mantellato Dias and Doyle scored on UH's first three possessions of the second quarter to stretch the lead to 8-0. Mantellato Dias scored her second goal before UCSD broke through with a Kendall Thomas goal midway through the second quarter.
Stertefeld scored the first goal of the third quarter, but UCSD surged back with Caroline Christl, who scored five goals in the regular-season meeting with UH, scoring three goals to cut UH's lead to 13-7.
Weston fired her second goal into the upper left corner early in the fourth quarter to end the UCSD run and Wedderburn added UH's eighth power-play goal.
Gomez de la Puente completed her hat trick at the 5:26 mark to extend UH's lead to 16-7. The Tritons outscored the 'Bows 3-1 in the final 3:12 of the match, but the 'Bows outstanding offensive performance was too much for the Tritons to overcome.
UH improved to 21-6 in the Big West Championship overall and 9-2 in the semifinal round.
In Saturday's second semifinal, Long Beach State knocked off two-time defending champion UC irvine 9-7 to advance to the Big West final for the first time since 2017. UH won its regular-season meeting with the Beach 13-6 on April 7 in Long Beach.
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