Calgary, Canada - January 30 - The USA Men's National Team fell to Canada 10-6
Calgary, Canada - January 30 - The USA Men's National Team fell to Canada 10-6 to open play at the UANA World Aquatic Championship qualification tournament in Calgary last night. Despite two goals from Scott Davidson (Seal Beach, CA/UCLA/NYAC), Team USA was unable to rally out of an early deficit. Team USA returns to action tonight when they take on Brazil at 8:50pm local time/7:50pm pst. A second place finish is needed in order to qualify for the 2013 FINA World Championships this summer in Barcelona, Spain.
Canada jumped out to an early 2-0 lead before the United States was able to find the goal on a tally from Davidson. Canada went ahead 3-1 before Jeffrey Schwimer (Beverly Hills, CA/Stanford/NYAC) connected for a 3-2 game. Team USA would get no closer as Canada ran off four straight goals to grab a 7-2 lead at halftime. Jeff Powers (San Luis Obispo, CA/UC-Irvine/Newport WPF) opened the scoring for the United States in the third to close within 7-3, only to have Canada score three straight to take a 10-3 lead with 2:24 left in the period.
Nikola Vavic (Palos Verdes, CA/USC/Trojan) and Ryan Bailey (Long Beach, CA/UC-Irvine/Newport WPF) scored to close out the third period, leaving Team USA down 10-5 headed to the fourth. Team USA was unable to complete the comeback as they could only muster one more goal, from Davidson, with 3:41 left in the match. They would get no closer and Canada would take the match 10-6.
"Canada came out strong," said USA Head Coach Jovan Vavic. "We did not give up and outplayed them in the second half. We are still learning to be a team, and will do much better tomorrow against Brazil."
Scoring - Scoresheet
USA 6 (2, 0, 3, 1) S. Davidson 2, R. Bailey 1, J. Schwimer 1, N. Vavic 1, J. Powers 1
CAN 10 (4, 3, 3, 0) N. Constantin 3, J. Boyd 3, C. Kudaba 1, O. Vikalo 1, J. Conway 1, J. McElroy 1
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Greg Mescall
Associate Director of Communications
USA Water Polo
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[email protected]
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Huntington Beach, CA 92648
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