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LOS ANGELES - The 2015 women's water polo season started with senior Mackenzie Beck scoring with 2:28 to play in the fourth quarter to lift LMU to a 11-10 win at the 2015 UCLA Invitational on Saturday afternoon.

The Lions finished the tournament and the opening day of the season with a split, falling to host and second-ranked UCLA in the finale, 21-5. The Lions are 1-1 as they head to the UC Santa Barbara Winter Invitational Jan. 24-25.

"This was our first game of the season and we have a lot of players either new to the program or being asked to fill new roles. With that, we have a lot of kinks to work out," said Head Coach Kyle Witt. "The most important part to Saturday was the progress, not necessarily the scores, and I felt we made some good progress. This season will be all about getting better each day."

Senior Laura Lopez scored five goals for the Lions in the opening win, four coming in a five-goal first period that got the Lions off to a fast start. Beck finished with three, scoring a pair in the final frame to lift the Lions to the win.

The Lions led 5-3 after the first period, but saw their lead fade away as the Roadrunners outscored the Lions 6-3 in the middle two frames. They would take a 9-8 lead with 27 seconds left in the third quarter.

It didn't last long as Kinglsey Hill scored on the first possession of the final quarter, tying the game at 9-9. Beck's goal with 6:13 to play on a 6-on-5 attack gave LMU a 10-9 lead. However, just over a minute later, CSUB scored on a their own 6-on-5 to tie the game and set-up Beck's winner.

The Lions' defense would fight off a pair of 6-on-5 advantages in the final two minutes to earn the win.

"In the win over CSUB, we made some errors that are very fixable. They were typical early season errors," said Witt. "Against UCLA, we knew going in the turn-around to face a team that is very, very good was short. So we played almost everyone. What we cared about was us. They are very good with some of the nation's top-rated players and we were playing freshman in their first day of games. I was happy with the experience and progress we made."

In the finale, Erin Byrne and Beck scored two goals each as the Bruins scored the game's first seven goals to put the game out of reach eary.

The Lions will open the Winter Invite with Claremont-Mudd-Scripps (12:20 pm) and Cal State Northridge (3:20 pm) on Saturday, followed by Sonoma State (9:15 am) and host UC Santa Barbara (1:00 pm) on Sunday.