Oct. 27, 2006

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Just Briefly
The Loyola Marymount University men's water polo team sit ranked eighth as they enter the stretch run to the 2006 season. The Lions will host a single game on the week and it is a big one as the Lions host third ranked UCLA on Saturday, Oct. 28 at 12 noon.

Looking at the Lions
Loyola Marymount is 14-9 on the season after going 2-2 last week and moving down one spot in the polls to No. 8. The Lions feature one of the nation's top defenses while sporting a balanced offensive attack. Senior Brian McShane leads a four-senior attack with 34 goals. Seniors Cutberto Hernandez and Matt Reynolds add 28 goals each. Reynolds led the Lions last week with seven goals. Senior Ben Easton adds 26. The Lions have scored 224 goals in 23 games this season, including a program-record 23 in the win over Gannon last Thursday.

In Net
The backbone of the Lions defense for the last three years has been senior Ian Elliott. And that has not changed this season. Elliott is in his fourth and final season of collegiate water polo at LMU and is a three-time first-team All-WWPA selection. In 23 games this season he has already made 249 saves, giving him an average of 10.8 saves per game. He is tops in the nation in saves. This season he has had double-digit saves in 14 of the Lions' 23 games this season. In his career he has made 1072 saves to set the all-time school mark. His career goals against average is 7.1. In 2005 he finished the regular season among the top-five nationally in saves with 304 while allowing just 6.64 goals per game. He played in every game and appeared in net for 135 of the Lions' 140 quarters.

The WWPA
ON A ROLL... This Western Water Polo Association has some of the hottest teams in the nation heading into the final month of play. UC San Diego is cruising at 19-4 overall and its only setbacks have come to the No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3 teams in the nation. Redlands and Santa Clara might be even hotter. Fresh off their upset win over then No. 7 LMU, Santa Clara is 9-1 in the WWPA , having won six straight, and 11 of their last 12. As for Redlands, they have climbed to second overall in the WWPA at 14-7 and have won seven straight and nine of thier last 10. Seven of the WWPA institutions find themselves listed in this week's national rankings. UC San Diego is still tops in the league at No. 5 while LMU sits at No. 8. UC Davis is next on the list at No. 13 while Santa Clara moved up two spots to No. 16. Air Force sits at No. 17, two spots better than No. 19 Redlands. The newcomer to the list is Pomona-Pitzer, who received a vote this week. IN GOOD HANDS... The national rankings is full of WWPA stars this season as Chapman's freshman Alex Mule is second in the nation in scoring with 72 goals. Senior Ty Lackey of UC San Diego and sophomore Jack Wall of Santa Clara are even in scoring with 54 goals each. The goalies aren't bad either in the WWPA as LMU senior Ian Elliott leads the nation with 256 saves, good for 11.5 saves per game. He has company in the top-10 as Air Force senior Denver Saunders is seventh (186 saves). Moving a head of Saunders this week is UC San Diego's Jeremy Randall in third with 214 saves. Freshman Colin Gasper from Chapman is 11th with 165 saves. Defense is a theme this season in the WWPA as Redlands is ranked sixth in the nation at 8.0 goals against per game while LMU is eighth at 8.2 goals and Air Force is ninth at 8.4.

Last Time Out
LMU 6, UC Davis 5Senior Cuberto Hernandez scored with seven seconds remaining in the game to give No. 7 Loyola Marymount a dramatic 6-5 come-from-behind victory over No. 13 UC Davis in Western Water Polo Association action on Sunday afternoon at the Schaal Aquatics Center. The goal capped a dramatic Lions' rally in which they outscored the Aggies 6-0 throughout the final 18 minutes of the game. The win improves LMU to 14-8 overall and 6-4 in the WWPA while the Aggies fall to 10-10 and 5-3 in conference. UC Davis came out firing against LMU to start the game with five unanswered goals and a 5-0 lead. The Lions finally got on the board with 39 seconds left in the half when senior Matt Reynolds scored to make the score 5-1 at halftime. LMU continued to slowly battle their way back into the match as Hernandez and Tim Hummel scored in the third quarter to cut the Aggie lead to 5-3. Unable to get any kind of offensive rhythm going, the Aggies were unable to score in the second period of play. Reynolds struck again with under four minutes left in the final quarter to make the score 5-4. Brian McShane's goal with 48 seconds left tied the game at 5-5 and marked five unanswered goal for the Lions. With only seven seconds remaining on the clock, Hernandez found the back of the net from about 5 meters.

In the Records
Senior Brian McShane scored 20 of his 37 goals in the final 12 games of the 2005 season. With his 34 goals this season, he has now scored 54 goals in the last 35games. He has 101 goals in his career at LMU, ranking him 16th in LMU history. Also in the rankings is senior Cutberto Hernandez with 71 assists to rank 6th all-time. Ian Elliott with 120 games played and Matt Reynolds with 116 are ranked 3rd and 6th all-time. Elliott and Reynolds are also 7th and 6th, respectively, in steals with 106 and 108.