{"id":65819,"date":"2025-11-23T00:05:24","date_gmt":"2025-11-23T00:05:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/65819\/"},"modified":"2025-11-23T00:05:24","modified_gmt":"2025-11-23T00:05:24","slug":"the-beach-outlast-tritons-to-advance-to-championship-final","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/65819\/","title":{"rendered":"The Beach outlast Tritons to advance to championship final"},"content":{"rendered":"

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LBSU junior attacker Caleb Francisco passes the ball across the pool in The Beach’s semifinal win over UC San Diego on Saturday, Nov. 22 at UC Irvine. Rehansa Kulatilleke | Long Beach Current<\/p>\n

IRVINE, Calif. \u2013 In a rematch of last year\u2019s championship final, No. 7 Long Beach State men\u2019s water polo advanced past the semifinals of the Big West Tournament with an 11-8 win over No. 13 UC San Diego at the Anteater Aquatics Complex at UC Irvine on Saturday, Nov. 22.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ahead of the start of the postseason, LBSU head coach Gavin Arroyo<\/a> made it known he saw the No. 4 seed Tritons as a major threat to take the conference crown.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cUC San Diego could easily win this tournament,\u201d Arroyo told the Current<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

On Saturday, it was clear the No. 1 seeded The Beach did not look past their semifinal opponent, taking a commanding 9-3 lead late before the Tritons managed a brief run that was too little, too late.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m super proud,\u201d Arroyo said. \u201cWe started off kind of shaky, and then we kind of hit our rhythm.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

LBSU head coach Gavin Arroyo rallies his team, as The Beach advanced to the Big West Championship Final with a win on Saturday over UC San Diego. Rehansa Kulatilleke | Long Beach Current<\/p>\n

In the game\u2019s first minute, freshman Triton attacker Jackson Boettner<\/a> momentarily silenced the visiting Beach fans, finding the back of the net to give UCSD a 1-0 lead.\u00a0<\/p>\n

However, it became clear early that UCSD could not defend LBSU\u2019s potent offensive attack without fouling, as The Beach drew seven exclusions in the first quarter and a yellow card from Triton senior utility Ante Buzov<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

LBSU\u2019s star sophomore center Gabi Acosta<\/a> shot wide on a power play opportunity at the midway point of the period, but made up for it on another six-on-five opportunity for The Beach\u2019s first score of the game.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI tried to prepare myself mentally 100% and go all out,\u201d Acosta said. \u201cI started pretty bad, missing shots, but then I kept working, the team kept passing me the ball and I started scoring.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following a UCSD goal from Buzov, LBSU added two more scores, one on a penalty strike down the middle from senior attacker Sandro Pueyo Caballero<\/a>, to finish the first quarter with a 3-2 advantage.<\/p>\n

The final Big West Player of the Week of this season, LBSU sophomore attacker Harper Stewart<\/a> made his presence felt offensively in the second quarter, assisting two Beach goals to take a 5-2 lead.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With just over a minute in the period, Acosta showed exactly why he is the reigning Big West Player of the Year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With seconds remaining on the shot clock, Acosta received a pass with his back to the basket, but fired a no-look backhand through the left side of the goal to beat the buzzer for his second score of the day.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI had the right position in the center and [sophomore center Corbin Stanley<\/a>] threw me the ball and I just tried to score however I can and it went in, so that was nice,\u201d Acosta said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

LBSU sophomore star center Gabi Acosta scored four goals in The Beach\u2019s semifinal win over UC San Diego on Saturday, Nov. 22 at UC Irvine. Rehansa Kulatilleke | Long Beach Current<\/p>\n

After giving up two quick goals in the first, LBSU sophomore goalkeeper Joe Jenness<\/a> tightened up with four saves in the half, allowing just one score in the final seconds to end the half up 6-3.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Jenness finished the match with a whopping 14 saves on a .636 save percentage in the victory.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is my first game in the Big West Tournament, so I think I needed to just settle in a little bit and trust my skills,\u201d Jenness said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Beach began to pour it on in the second half, extending its lead to 9-3 with a trio of scores from\u00a0Stanley, Acosta and junior utility Marc Frigola Navarro<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

UCSD once again scored in the final seconds of a quarter to cut the deficit to five heading into the fourth by way of a goal from redshirt junior attacker Reef Lippa<\/a>, sparking a major run for the Tritons.\u00a0<\/p>\n

LBSU was dominated for the majority of the fourth, as UCSD caught fire with a 4-0 run to come within two scores.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Beach\u2019s offense looked out of sorts for the majority of the final quarter, but a much-needed strike from Stewart rendered the Tritons\u2019 late run futile, putting LBSU up 10-7.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe run through scenarios playing with a lead,\u201d Jenness said. \u201cWe let them get on a run, but we controlled ourselves, we knew the whole time we had control over what we do.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

After a final score from UCSD, Acosta put a bow on the semifinal matchup with his fourth goal of the contest to end the Tritons\u2019 season.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

LBSU senior driver Itai Roth defends a pass, as The Beach hung on to defeat UC San Diego and advance to the Big West Tournament Final at UC Irvine. Rehansa Kulatilleke | Long Beach Current<\/p>\n

Along with Acosta\u2019s four scores, seven Beach players found the back of the net in the win, with Stewart scoring a tied team-high points with one goal and three assists.\u00a0<\/p>\n

On Sunday, LBSU will look to repeat as conference champions, facing the winner of the semifinal matchup between No. 8 UC Davis and No. 12 UC Santa Barbara. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LBSU junior attacker Caleb Francisco passes the ball across the pool in The Beach’s semifinal win over UC…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":65820,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[131,133,132],"class_list":["post-65819","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65819"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65819\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}