LOS ANGELES — The No. 12 UC Santa Barbara Men's Water Polo team knew they were going to need some luck to upset No. 1 UCLA on Friday night, and the Gauchos did not get that. Head coach Wolf Wigo said the Bruins put together one of the best shooting performances he had ever seen as UCLA downed his Gauchos, 16-8. The silver lining for Wigo and Santa Barbara is that graduate defender Marko Ilic played his first minutes in Blue and Gold after a foot injury kept him out of early season action. The Serbian marked his debut with a goal in the fourth quarter.  
 
FROM HEAD COACH WOLF WIGO
"(UCLA) were shooting the crap out of the ball," Wigo said. "I haven't seen any team shoot like that. If I could take the game back, we'd probably change the game plan a little bit, not let them shoot as much from the outside, but we didn't want to give up counter goals and we didn't, didn't want to give up center goals and we only gave up one. You kind of pick your poison with this team. They're the top team in the country, and we needed some luck, have them hit some bars, and it didn't happen. They didn't miss.
 
"It's nice to have Marko in the water. He's very limited and he probably wasn't ready to even play that, but he did a good job and scored a goal, which is fun. He showed a lot of potential that we'll have in probably two weeks when he gets in shape."
 
HOW IT HAPPENED
The Gauchos were fired up and started red hot, with Adam Gyenis scoring the first two goals of the game while Levi Lentin and Santa Barbara's defense kept UCLA off the scoreboard for nearly the first four minutes. However, once the Bruins broke through, they went on a 3-0 run to take the lead. Dom Brown scored with just over two minutes in the first quarter to tie the game back up, but that would be the last time the scores would be level.
 
UCLA put together a 4-0 run to end the first and start the second, though Brock Zamanian tallied the last goal before halftime. In the third, the Bruins put together another 4-0 run, but Sam McKenzie and Luke Bachler scored late in the frame for Santa Barbara.
 
While the Bruins led, 15-6, with four minutes left to play in the game, the Gauchos showed some promise for the future, locking down on defense and putting home a couple more goals before the buzzer. Wyatt Pieretti played the final 4:47 in goal for Santa Barbara and made a selection of good saves to cool off the UCLA offense, while Ilic tallied his first goal as a Gaucho and McKenzie tallied his second of the game.
 
UP NEXT
Santa Barbara will have the chance to bounce back Saturday morning, stopping in Thousand Oaks to take on Cal Lutheran at 9 a.m. and Westcliff at 11 a.m. Both games will take place at the Kingsmen's Samuelson Aquatics Center and will have live stats available through ucsbgauchos.com. Additionally, the Gauchos' matchup with Cal Lutheran will be live streamed on FloSwimming.com.