SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — The No. 19 UC Santa Barbara Women's Water Polo team (13-10, 0-3 Big West) saw Imani Clemons score a career-high five goals on Sunday, helping the Gauchos take No. 16 UC Davis (11-11, 2-1 Big West) into golden-goal overtime, but the Aggies emerged with a 12-11 win in the extra periods. Ava Donleavy had a mega day at goalkeeper for the Gauchos too, making 13 saves on the afternoon.

HOW IT HAPPENED
UC Davis had the faster start of the two teams, leading 2-0 after the first quarter, but Santa Barbara responded in the second. Bella Mady drew a five-meter penalty and Christina Mullane converted it just a minute and a half into the second, then Clemons scored her first goal of the day to tie the scores at 2-2. UC Davis re-took the lead shortly after, but Mullane scored again to answer. Again the Aggies re-took the lead, this time with just a minute left in the frame, but again the Gauchos answered, with Clemons scoring with just 30 seconds before halftime. At the break, the teams were tied with four goals apiece.

Santa Barbara had to keep chasing in the third, when Davis scored first to lead again. Annie Kuester provided the answer a minute and 20 seconds later, then Mady and Mullane combined to draw and convert a second five-meter penalty. That gave the Gauchos their first lead of the afternoon, just 47 seconds after Kuester had fired home the equalizer. The see-saw that was the third quarter only continued though, with the Aggies scoring twice to re-take the lead, 7-6. Clemons scored again to tie it less than 20 seconds later, but again UC Davis grabbed the lead by the end of the frame.

The Aggies extended their lead to 9-7 with the first goal of the fourth quarter, but Clemons provided another near-immediate answer, then scored again with four and a half minutes to play, tying the game at 9-9. Neither team could score in what remained of regulation though, thanks in large part to Donleavy, who made two huge one-on-one saves to deny the Aggies any more goals.

Davis did manage to break through in the first three-minute overtime period, scoring twice, but Santa Barbara kept themselves alive with two goals, both from Kuester, one in the first half of OT and another in the second. With the scores still tied, the game entered the golden-goal phase, where the next team to score would win. The Aggies got the ball first and the Gauchos got a stop, but they were not able to end the game with their first possession. When Davis got the ball back, they got a six-on-five opportunity after Santa Barbara was whistled for an exclusion foul, and the Gauchos could not kill off the penalty. 

UP NEXT
With finals coming up next week, Santa Barbara will not play again until March 28, when they will travel to No. 13 UC Irvine.