Last Tuesday night the men's water polo team took down Connecticut College to become the first water polo team in Brown's history to go undefeated in league play. Having left their mark on the East Coast, the No. 18 Bears traveled to Southern California to take on some of the best teams in the country. In four hard fought games, the Bears came out on top against Claremont-Mudd-Scripps but fell to No. 6 Loyola Marymount, No. 4 UCLA and No. 9 UC Irvine.
"It was a tough weekend," said Assistant Coach John McBride. "We definitely had some rough spots but we have a good foundation to work from. We want to win Easterns and we need those kind of games to do that."
The Bears started off their California trip with a tough loss against LMU on Saturday afternoon by a score of 13-4.
Captain Grant LeBeau '09 led the Bears on offense, scoring their only goal in the first half. But the Lions finished off the first half with a 7-1 lead. Gordon Hood '11 tired to jump-start Brown's offense in the third quarter with a goal, while LeBeau and Brandon Yoshimura '11 each scored in the fourth.
Kent Holland '10 worked hard in the cage, tallying nine saves throughout the game. But LMU continued to attack the Bears, scoring another six goals to finish out the game at 13-4.
Bruno was back in action later that afternoon to take down Claremont by a score of 12-8.
"The Claremont game was good because we held it together even though we were tired," said Hank Weintraub '09. "That was big after playing LMU."
Hood continued to dominate the Bears' offense, scoring three goals for Brown. But Hood wasn't the only one scoring. Mike Gartner '09, Corey Schwartz '11 and Weintraub each scored two goals. Yoshimura and LeBeau also scored one goal apiece.
"Gordon probably led the team in goals, which is really impressive since he's our primary defender," said LeBeau. "But overall I think that the weekend was really a team effort."
When teams put extra pressure on Gartner, they left Hood and the other members of the Brown offense open. The team also relied on their bench players throughout the weekend to ease the pressure of the starters.
"It was a good opportunity for our bench players to get some good experience," McBride said. "We're going to need our bench if we want to win Easterns."
On Sunday, the Bears took on two more top-ten competitors, falling to UCLA, 14-2, and UC Irvine, 13-9.
The UCLA Bruins got an early lead against the Bears, and Brown was only able to get one goal, scored by Yoshimura, in the first half, bringing the score to 8-1. While UCLA continued to score in the second half, Hood was able to notch another goal for Bruno with seven minutes left to play. Despite the 14-2 final score, Brown's defense put together some impressive highlights against the powerful Bruins' attack.
"Kent blocked a couple one-on-nobodies, which was incredible," Weintraub said.
Against the UC Irvine Anteaters the Bears got off to another slow start, leaving them down 9-2 at the half.
"It's obviously difficult playing teams that practice 360 days a year like UC Irvine does," LeBeau said. "It was really impressive to see the guys really rally."
With two minutes remaining in the third quarter, Brown earned a six-on-five opportunity, giving Nico Fort '09 the chance to put one away. This brought the score to 10-6.
The Bears continued to fight back, earning another man-up opportunity with four minutes left to play. And hitting Hood for the goal, they brought the score to 11-8.
But the Anteaters pulled away again, adding another two goals to increase their lead. While down late, the Bears continued to work hard, as LeBeau scored his second penalty shot of the game with 49 seconds to play. Unfortunately for the Bears, the clock ran out on their comeback attempt, as the Anteaters held them off by a final score of 13-9.
"Irvine was good because of the way we kept fighting," Weintraub said. "We didn't pull off the comeback but we didn't give up, which was a testament to our toughness - that four games in we're still working hard."
This weekend, the Bears head to Princeton University to take on Bucknell, George Washington and Navy.
"This last weekend was good because it magnified every error that we made, every weakness that we had," LeBeau said. "This upcoming weekend will be a big measuring stick for how we will do at Easterns. I think we are all eager to show how hard we've been working."
