COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — The No. 14 UC Santa Barbara Men's Water Polo team heads for the mountains this weekend, playing its first game at the U.S. Air Force Academy since 2007. The Gauchos will take on Air Force as part of the Falcons' Rare Air Challenge. In total, Santa Barbara will play four games: one against Austin College on Friday night, two on Saturday against Wagner and Air Force, then a final contest on Sunday against Occidental.
KNOW BEFORE YOU GO
Gaucho fans traveling to the Air Force Academy for the matches must obtain a visitor's pass to enter the base, which can be obtained by filling out a form at
this link.
LAST TIME OUT
The Gauchos head to Colorado looking to bounce back after a frustrating weekend at the MPSF Invitational in Stanford. Santa Barbara went 1-3, with a win over Santa Clara but losses to Long Beach State, Princeton and Pepperdine. Agonizingly, the Gauchos were two seconds away from upsetting the then-eighth-ranked Tigers on Saturday, only for Princeton to score a late equalizer and win in overtime.
The stellar Serbian,
Luigi Canepa, once again led the Santa Barbara offense last weekend, tallying nine goals across the four games. He was instrumental in the Gauchos' effort against Princeton, scoring five times. Earlier that same day, another exciting freshman also had a five-goal game;
Dash D'Ambrosia's career day made him the leading scorer as Santa Barbara took down Santa Clara; he totaled seven goals across the weekend.
SCOUTING THE OPPONENTS
Austin College started its season at the Navy Invitational in Maryland earlier this month, where four of the Division-III Kangaroos' five games were against Division-I opposition. The 'Roos have not played since back-to-back losses to Navy in Annapolis on Sept. 6, by a combined score of 32-11. Austin College returns one of its two All-Americans in sophomore attacker Owen Altermatt.
Wagner is making its one and only trip west for the season this weekend, with the Seahawks looking to build momentum after their first Division-I victory of the season last time out. Wagner defeated Mercyhurst, 17-15, to end its weekend at the Bucknell Invite in Pennsylvania and will be playing its first game of this weekend when it meets Santa Barbara on Saturday. Australian attacker Smith Connors ran riot in the win over the Lakers, scoring six goals.
Air Force has a marquee matchup with No. 18 Navy to handle before they dive into hosting duties this weekend; a win over the Midshipmen on Thursday would not only bring the Freedom Vase back to Colorado for the first time since 2022 but also extend the Falcons' winning streak to eight games. Not all of Air Force's seven straight wins have come easily though. They took golden-goal overtime to beat Division-III Johns Hopkins and six extra minutes to take down George Washington a day later. Their last game, against Division-II Concordia Irvine, also went to overtime. The Falcons are led by Tom Leggett, who has a whopping 70 goals and 21 assists through the Academy's first 14 games.
Occidental will likely be glad to finally be seeing the last of the Gauchos on Sunday. Santa Barbara has put 36 goals past the Tigers in two meetings already this season, while allowing just 13 goals across those two games. In their first get-together,
Finn Byrne kept a shutout across the entire first half as the Gauchos scored 16 consecutive goals to start the game. On the attacking end, no one in Blue and Gold has mauled the Tigers more than
Kyle Franks; the freshman from Brea has six goals across the two games.
FOLLOW ALONG
Start times — all Pacific — are set for 6:30 p.m. Friday against the 'Roos, 12 noon against the Seahawks and 6 p.m. against the hosting Falcons on Saturday and 12:30 to wrap the weekend against the Tigers on Sunday. All four games will be streamed live on Air Force's YouTube channel and all four will have live stats and play-by-play updates available through ucsbgauchos.com.
