Sept. 25, 2016 Video Highlights & Postgame Interviews
ANNAPOLIS, Md. - The Navy water polo team went 1-1 on Sunday in a pair of Mid-Atlantic Water Polo Conference contests at home in Scott Natatorium. The Mids (6-6, 1-3 MAWPC) secured a 13-7 victory over the Seahawks of Wagner (3-10, 0-3 MAWPC) in the morning before coming back in the afternoon and battling with the Fordham Rams (5-5, 2-1 MAWPC) over 38 minutes of tight, overtime action. The Rams pulled out the 14-13 win in extra time over the Mids.
Centers David Huber (Sr., Fort Washington, Pa.) and Jared Castillo (Jr., League City, Texas) led Navy offensively with five goals on the day, while freshman goalie Ronan Williams (Severna Park, Md.) combined to make 27 saves over the two league matches.
Navy 13 - Wagner 7
The first-ever meeting between Navy and Wagner, who is playing in its first season of NCAA action, saw the Mids and Seahawks play a competitive opening 10 minutes before a lengthy seven-goal run during the middle portion of the game turned a 3-2 score into a 10-2 margin and an eventual victory for the host Navy squad.
In the first quarter, the Mids recorded the first goals of the game as Castillo and Taylor Bernhardt (So., Annapolis, Md.) found the back of the net in the opening 90 seconds of play. After Wagner scored at the 3:53 mark of the quarter, Huber responded less than a minute later with his first goal. The two teams traded scores in the final two minutes as the Seahawks cut their deficit to 3-2 before Shepherd Warren (Jr., Baltimore, Md.) closed the quarter with a goal at 0:11.
Warren's tally was the first of seven straight unanswered goals for the Mids over a stretch of play that reached until the 2:39 mark of the third quarter. During that span Castillo, Huber, Matt Skowronski (Jr., Oak Hill, Va.), Nik Galvan (Fr., Henderson, Nev.) and Taylor Peterson (Sr., Rancho Santa Margarita, Calif.) twice all scored for Navy to make it 10-2. Following a Wagner goal, Navy finished the third period on a two-goal run with Brendan Metcalf (Sr., Frisco, Texas) and Trevor Clark (Fr., San Marcos, Calif.) both beating the Seahawks' goalie Joseph Ferraro.
With the game securely in the Mids' hand at a 12-3 margin after three quarters, the final eight minutes of play went the way of the Seahawks, 4-1, to tighten the final score to 13-7. Tyler Zimmerman (Jr., McLean, Va.) netted Navy's lone tally in the fourth quarter.
The freshman duo of Williams and Brandon Shields (Fr., Lake Forest, Calif.) backstopped the Mids to the victory in goal with Williams playing the first three quarters and making 14 saves, while Shields played the fourth quarter and recorded four stops.
"Today we were faced with two very strong, physical teams," remarked Navy head coach Mladen Stanicic. "Versus Wagner we played a very good first half that allowed us to use a bit more of our depth in the second half and still hold a somewhat comfortable margin. As a first-year team, their future is promising as they showed a very competitive nature and fought hard throughout."
Fordham 14 - Navy 13 (OT)
The afternoon contest between Navy and Fordham was action-packed throughout all 38 minutes of overtime play as at no point did any team have more than a two-goal lead.
Navy picked up the first of its three early two-goal leads right off the bat as Castillo and Huber recorded back-to-back markers at 6:57 and 6:25. One minute later, Fordham found its way into the scoring column to make it 2-1. The Mids stretched their lead back out to two when Huber tickled the twine at 4:32. Over the final 110 seconds of the first quarter, the Rams knotted the game at 3-3.
Fordham continued its small goal-run in the early portion of the second quarter as the netted a power play marker at 6:03 to go up 4-3. In a stretch of play from 3:01 through 1:48, Navy responded emphatically with three unanswered scores. Huber got the Mids going with his third goal of the game as he recovered a rebounded shot and beat the Rams' goalie Alex Jahns. Less than a minute later at 2:21, Peterson and Galvan hooked up for a power play marker as Peterson lofted a pass from the wing into Galvan in the center, who flicked a one-timer shot in for a goal. Peterson got himself a goal on the next possession to send the game into halftime at 6-4.
A very defensive third quarter saw just two total goals be scored as Fordham notched both to tie the game up for the third time at six-all.
In the fourth quarter, the game opened up with eight goals being scored. The action came in flows with four goals from 7:41 to 6:16 and four more from 2:15 to 0:05. Every goal that was scored by one team was immediately countered by the opponent within 50 seconds as Navy chased Fordham in each of the Rams' first three scores. Down 7-6, Galvan scored for the Mids to make it 7-7 before Peterson netted a power play marker at 6:16 to make it 8-8. Trailing 9-8, Warren beat Jahns with a 5-meter penalty shot at 1:51. Navy took its first lead of the fourth quarter with under a minute to play as Warren passed the ball in from the perimeter to Castillo in the post to score at 0:52. Fordham skirted defeat and evened the game at 10-10 with 4.8 seconds left in regulation.
In overtime, Navy jumped out to a 12-11 lead through the first half of the period as the team recorded a pair of goals in the final 24.0 seconds. Castillo scored first off of Metcalf assist before Skowronski netted an unassisted goal off of a quick restart and long-range shot with 5.0 seconds remaining.
In the second half of the overtime, Fordham took the lead back with goals on consecutive possessions at 1:44 and 1:02. Down 13-12, Navy tied the game for the 10th time as Galvan notched a power play marker at 0:43 on a quick restart by Peterson on the wing. The game-winning tally came for Fordham with 29.7 seconds remaining as Cole Donnelly scored his first goal of the game to make it 14-13.
Williams was strong once again for the Mids in goal as he made 13 saves in a complete game effort.
"This was a very tight game with both teams fighting hard the entire time," said Stanicic. "Looking back we will focus on the opportunities that we missed and mental errors that we made in critical moments. At points we got baited into taking too many outside shots as Fordham collapsed into the middle on our centers. A lot of our young freshmen were in the pool down the stretch in pressure-packed situations and moving forward that experience will help them individually, as well as us a team.
"In both games today, I was pleased with the improvement that we had in terms of intensity and energy. That is very positive and something that we will look forward to more of in the coming weeks when we meet all four of these conference opponents again."
In just seven days, Navy will meet both Wagner and Fordham again in a New York City doubleheader on Sunday, Oct. 2. The Mids will first play in Staten Island versus the Seahawks at 11 a.m. before heading over to the Bronx to matchup with the Rams in a 4 p.m. showdown.
