Water Polo

Aztec Water Polo Spends Spring Break In Hawaii

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April 3, 2003

SAN DIEGO - The sixth-ranked San Diego State women's water polo team, winner of five of its last seven games, spends its spring break in the 50th state with a game at No. 8 Hawai'i on Saturday.

  • The Aztecs (14-8 overall/4-5 MPSF) complete conference play with the 10 a.m. HST game at the Rainbow Wahine's Duke Kahanamoku Aquatic Complex, rescheduled from April 4 at 6 p.m. A victory over Hawai'i (8-11/2-5) would give SDSU a 5-5 MPSF mark, as the Aztecs are looking for their first .500 conference season since the 1998 team finished 5-4. And in the race for MPSF Tournament seeding where the top five teams from the regular season earn first-round byes, a win by the sixth-place Aztecs would apply some pressure on fifth-place California. The Golden Bears, who are 4-2 in the MPSF entering the weekend, still have four conference games remaining - including contests versus UCSB on Friday, No. 1 UCLA on Saturday and No. 2 Stanford on April 12 - but possess the tiebreaker over the Aztecs by virtue of a 9-8 win at SDSU on March 15.

Recapping Last Week's Action

  • SDSU split a pair of conference games last weekend, following up perhaps its worst defensive effort of the season with its best.
  • The Aztecs hung with UCLA for the first half of the March 28 contest, but the Bruins asserted their No. 1 ranking and handed SDSU its worst defeat of the season, 10-2. The Aztecs stood within 2-1 after the first quarter and 4-1 at the half, but Kristyn Pulver's three-goal effort and seven saves from Jaime Hipp led the way for the Bruins. Amber Prestegard and Holly Hartzell scored for the Aztecs.
  • The Aztecs rebounded in impressive fashion on March 29, limiting No. 11 UC Santa Barbara to a season-low by an Aztec opponent with just three goals in a 6-3 victory. Junior Holly Hartzell scored four goals, including the 200th of her career, and junior goalie Ashley Zabel made five saves as SDSU picked up its second win of the season over the Gauchos.

The Hartzell Watch: 203 And Counting

  • Junior 2-meter Holly Hartzell (Vista, Calif./Fallbrook HS) almost single-handedly accounted for the Aztec offense last weekend, scoring five of SDSU's eight goals against No. 1 UCLA and No. 11 UC Santa Barbara. Her game-high four-goal effort against the Gauchos included the 200th score of her career, as she became just the fourth Aztec to reach the milestone and the first to achieve it in three seasons.
  • Hartzell now has a total of 203 goals for her career, fourth all-time at SDSU, and is just two scores shy of Shae Philpott's third-place total of 205. Larisa Baltgalvis holds the all-time record of 235 goals, a mark that senior Amber Prestegard (216 goals) could threaten with a solid finish to the season.
  • Hartzell leads the Aztecs this season with 45 goals. She is also climbing the career assists (3rd, 62) and steals (5th, 136) charts at SDSU.

Aztec 2-Meter Shots

  • At 14-8, SDSU has matched its best 22-game start in the past seven seasons. The 14-8 mark was also achieved in 2001, 1999 and 1998.
  • The Aztecs have achieved their impressive record thus far by taking care of their lower-ranked opponents. The Aztecs, who were ranked No. 8 in the preseason poll and then climbed to No. 7 and their current No. 6 ranking, are 12-0 this season versus lower-ranked and unranked teams. Conversely, SDSU is just 2-8 against higher-ranked teams, with the wins coming over No. 4 Long Beach State on Feb. 9 and No. 6 Loyola Marymount on March 9.
  • Current Aztecs rank first, second and third on SDSU's career assists list. Amber Prestegard is the career leader with 103 assists, while Casey Finnegan is second with 67 and Holly Hartzell stands third at 62.
  • In allowing a season-low three goals for a full game in the 6-3 win over No. 11 UCSB, junior goalie Ashley Zabel (San Diego, Calif./Scripps Ranch HS) lowered her season goals allowed average to 5.96 per game. She is averaging 8.49 saves per game.

Scouting No. 8 Hawai'i

  • The eighth-ranked Rainbow Wahine turned around their season with a strong showing at their March 28-30 Rainbow Challenge. Hawai'i won all four of its games against NCAA opponents, including an impressive 10-6 over No. 4 Long Beach State, and took second in the tournament with a 5-1 record after a 7-2 exhibition loss to the Australian national team in the championship. Kristy Bagnall scored nine goals in the event and was selected to the all-tournament team.
  • The Rainbow Wahine's current four-game win streak after the Rainbow Challenge has doubled their victory total for the season.
  • Hawai'i holds an all-time record of 7-5 against SDSU. The teams split their meetings last season, with the Rainbow Wahine claiming the regular-season meeting 11-10 behind seven goals from Karin van Hoff and SDSU winning the MPSF Tournament match-up 9-8 to take seventh place at the tourney.

Head Coach Carin Crawford

  • In her fifth season leading the Aztec program, Crawford has guided the Aztecs to four straight top-eight national finishes and seasons of 18 or more wins while compiling an overall record of 98-74. She has coached six All-Americans, seven all-MPSF performers, 10 all-MPSF academic selections and 13 AWPCA all-academic honorees.

2003 Aztec Women's Water Polo Stat Leaders Goals GoalsNo Player GP-GS Att Scored Ast Stl Saves1 A. Zabel 17-14 2 0 10 12 1211A S. Daseler 12-8 0 0 4 11 705 C. Finnegan 20-20 91 28 17 48 16 D. Delgado 21-11 38 12 13 21 29 S. Onweller 21-11 49 11 11 7 310 Prestegard 21-21 96 40 23 11 014 H. Hartzell 21-21 100 45 13 34 1
MPSF Standings (as of Apr. 1) School MPSF Pct. Overall Pct.1. Stanford 5-0 1.000 13-1 .9292. USC 8-1 .889 15-3 .8333. UCLA 5-2 .714 16-3 .842 L.B. State 5-2 .714 16-5 .7625. California 4-2 .667 11-5 .6886. SDSU 4-5 .444 14-8 .6367. S.J. State 3-5 .375 13-10 .5658. UCSB 2-4 .333 14-9 .6099. Hawai'i 2-5 .286 8-11 .42110. UC Irvine 1-6 .143 14-15 .48311. Pacific 0-7 .000 5-14 .263
AWPCA Top 20 (Apr. 2) School1. UCLA2. Stanford3. USC4. Long Beach State5. California6. San Diego State7. Loyola Marymount8. Hawai'i9. San Jose State10. UC Santa Barbara11. UC San Diego12. Michigan13. Princeton14. Indiana15. UC Davis16. Hartwick17. UC Irvine18. Brown19. Arizona State20. Cal Baptist