Jacob Mercep - (Tag)

Nikos Delagrammatikas Goal Seals California’s 15th NCAA Men’s Water Polo Title Nikos Delagrammatikas’ goal with 28 seconds left on Sunday was the decider in an epic NCAA men’s water polo title game, allowing No. 2 seed California to upend top-ranked USC, 13-12. Delagrammatikas, who tallied a goal an...

In 2019 NCAA Men's Water Polo Tournament action Thursday at Pacific’s Chris Kjeldsen Pool, third-seeded Pepperdine and #4 USC won and advanced to the semifinals, to be held Saturday. The Waves, appearing in the national championship for the first time in two decades, rode a six-goal explosion by Chr...

By Michael Randazzo, Swimming World Contributor Earlier today The Olympic Club in San Francisco announced three finalists for this year's Peter J. Cutino award. As is often the case with an honor of this magnitude—selecting the year's top male collegiate water polo player—intrigue swirls around who ...

The Collegiate Water Polo Association Men’s Varsity Water Polo Top-Ten was unchanged from last week, but a reordering at the top is almost certain to occur this weekend. Two of the nation’s top four teams have competitive matches—against each other. That would be the top-ranked Trojans of USC—3-0 la...

By Michael Randazzo, Swimming World Contributor USC blitzed Stanford for five goals in the first period, then had to hang on for dear life as a desperate Cardinal rally fell short, making the Trojans 14-12 victors in the 2018 Men’s Water Polo Tournament final at Avery Aquatic Center. “There are goin...

STOCKTON, CA. In a hard fought and well-played game which was tied 8 times, the top seed Stanford Cardinal advanced to the championship game with 15-14 sudden victory over #4 seed USC. Redshirt Junior Ben Hallock finished off a set play with his 3rd goal 11 seconds into the 3rd overtime period to gi...

By Michael Randazzo. Swimming World Contributor On Sunday, the NCAA men’s varsity water polo season came to a close as USC jumped out to a huge lead then held on for a 14-12 national title win over Stanford at Avery Aquatic Center. It was a fitting end to the NCAA’s fiftieth national championship to...

Saturday at Stanford's Avery Aquatic Center, two noteworthy streaks were on the line in semifinal matches for the 2018 NCAA Men’s Water Polo Tournament. One amounted to a relatively impossible dream: UC San Diego's quest to be the first non-Division I team in two decades to advance to the national c...

Water Polo: USC Leads Way with Three Finalists for Cutino Award Three players from USC are among the six finalists for the men’s and women’s Peter J. Cutino Award, announced on Thursday. Finalists for the men’s award as USC’s Jacob Mercep, UCLA’s Nicolas Saveljic and the University of California’s N...

By Michael Randazzo, Swimming World Contributor After marching unopposed this season to 17 wins, on Saturday in Palo Alto USC ran into a determined Stanford squad, which claimed a 13-11 decision over the nation's top-ranked squad. The host Cardinal, which at one point enjoyed a five-goal advantage b...

Swimming World continues its previews of the six conferences that will send teams to the 2018 NCAA Men’s Water Polo Tournament, to be held November 29 – December 2 at Stanford’s Avery Aquatic Center. Look to SW for in-depth stories and game recaps of all the action from this year’s exciting NCAA men...

The opening day of competition at the 2019 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) Invitational saw no upsets as all the higher seeded teams advanced to second round action Saturday at UCLA's Spieker Aquatics Center. Opening play were the host Bruins, who got two goals apiece from Jake Cavano, Fel...

In an announcement last weekend that overlapped the 2019 NCAA Women’s Water Polo Tournament, The Olympic Club released the finalists for the Peter J. Cutino Award. For the men—previously announced last December—the nominees are Ben Hallock (Stanford), Johnny Hooper (Cal), and Alex Wolf (UCLA). The w...

By Michael Randazzo, Swimming World Contributor The 2018 Association of Collegiate Water Polo Coaches (ACWPC) Division I All-America selections are now out, and—no surprise–they confirm the strength of the pool of talent at Cal, Stanford, UCLA and USC. 18 members of the big four were among the count...

For the first time in weeks, there’s relative stability at the top of the Collegiate Water Polo Association Top 20 poll. Stanford, UCLA and Pacific remained in the top three spots; leapfrogging UC Santa Barbara for #4 in the rankings was USC, a 10-9 winner over the Gauchos on Sunday in Santa Barbara...

LOS ANGELES, CA. In a contest marked by 38 total exclusions and nine players fouling out, USC (8-2) built a five-goal lead through the first three quarters then withstood a late rally by California (9-5) to take fifth place at the 2019 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) Invitational by a scor...

By Michael Randazzo, Swimming World Contributor With one week remaining, a pair of match-ups in Los Angeles today between Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) rivals set the stage for a compelling finish to the 2018 NCAA men’s varsity water polo regular season. #3 Cal will travel to Uytengsu Aq...

With the start of a new season for the USC men's water polo team less than a week away, a new coach has stepped into the void created by the abrupt firing of Jovan Vavic last March. But the first new head coach of Trojan men's and women's program in a quarter century is actually not so new. Marko Pi...

By Michael Randazzo, Swimming World Contributor Bruce Watson, head coach for the San José State men’s water polo team, exudes the captivating “California Cool” that many associate with the country’s most populous state, Tall, lanky and with an impressive tan that comes from decades as both surfer an...

By Michael Randazzo, Swimming World Contributor At the top of the list of Division I All-Americans released yesterday by the Association of Collegiate Water Polo Coaches (ACWPC) are the usual programs, identified by the media as the “Big Four:” Cal, Stanford, UCLA and USC. Those top polo programs co...