LA MIRADA --- Biola Men's Water Polo opened their home opener with a 15-5 victory over Whittier on Saturday night in the Biola Round Robin at Splash! La Mirada Regional Aquatics Center.
"The team has done a lot of intentional work since ending last year and building off of the lessons we learned," stated head coach Jens Cole. We set high expectations and high standards for how we want to go about things tactically within the game, within our fundamentals and on the mental side and the emotional side. We brought in so many great guest speakers these last few months and I think the guys have just really retained the importance of not getting too high and not getting too low and just being a team that can weather storms."
"I think today and really this weekend was a testament to that," continued Cole. "There were moments where we'd go up by a few and then the opponent would have some sort of response and our guys did an amazing job of just weathering the runs and staying consistent and staying true to who they are."
Noah Ryznar led the way with five goals and an assist, while Caden Digby added a hat trick. Landon Heuer and Carson Crocket each chipped in two goals as seven different Eagles found the back of the cage.
Biola established control early behind a strong defensive effort. Heuer opened the scoring just over three minutes into the match before Ryznar converted on a power play to give the Eagles a 2-0 advantage at the end of the first quarter.
The Eagles continued to pull away in the second. Ryznar struck again before Digby added his first goal of the night to make it 4-0. Heuer followed with his second before Whittier finally broke through with 2:18 remaining in the half.
The Poets' momentum was short-lived, as Ryan Previch answered just 21 seconds later off a feed from Micah Hernandez to send Biola into halftime with a 6-1 lead.
The Eagles put the game away with an offensive outburst in the third quarter, outscoring Whittier 7-2.
Ryznar opened the second half with back-to-back goals before Digby converted a penalty shot to stretch the lead to 9-1. After Whittier scored twice, Biola responded with four unanswered goals to close the period. Crocket scored twice during the run, Kevin Slack connected on a power play and Digby completed his hat trick with 14 seconds remaining.
Biola entered the fourth with a 13-3 advantage. Ryznar added his fifth goal of the night off an assist from Aiden Ortiz, while Colton Brown capped the scoring for the Eagles with 49 seconds remaining off a feed from Myles Long.
Ryznar finished with a team-high six points on five goals and an assist. Crocket added an assist to his two-goal performance, while Ortiz recorded two assists.
Biola was disruptive defensively throughout the night, collecting 15 steals and limiting Whittier to 19 shots. Slack led the Eagles with four steals, Isaac Demski added three and Hernandez recorded two.
Cooper Smith made four saves in nearly 24 minutes in the cage, while Maddox Levandusky also saw time in goal for the Eagles.
"Obviously, a very exciting weekend," said Cole. "There's still a lot we can get better at, but overall every member of the team contributed and just the energy of the group is obviously at a high and our goal is just to make sure we are sustaining that as best we can through the remainder of the season."Â
Cole concluded, "We are so thankful for the fans that came out. We were talking about the tradition of men's water polo and how we'd like that to be a tradition of having just the community come out and support us and enjoy watching us play and that's just as important to us as you know it's getting a win but is playing. Great water polo for the supporters to enjoy and a huge shout out to the fans that came, that was awesome."
Biola improved to 2-1 on the season and returns to action Thursday, Sept. 3 at the Pepperdine Round Robin in Malibu. The Eagles will face host Pepperdine at 12 p.m. before taking on UC Santa Barbara at 2:30 p.m. at Raleigh Runnels Memorial Pool.
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