Women's Water Polo FInishes '17 Season

The Pasadena City College women's water polo team went 1-2 at the South Coast Conference Championships Nov. 3-4 at Mt. San Antonio College. The Lancers settled for sixth place in the SCC after losing the fifth place final and season finale to East Los Angeles, 14-10.

PCC closed things with a 9-16 overall record (4-7 mark in the SCC). For the first time in Lancers' history, four players reached 30 or more goals in a season. Freshman Briana Santos led the squad with 51 goals, first-year player Yesenia Marin had 42 goals, freshman Camila Grases 38 goals and sophomore Zuri Pulido netted 33 goals. Letterman Christy Lam added 22 goals and led PCC in assists with 33 while freshman Jennifer Ortega just missed giving the team six 20-goal scorers as she had 19.

Goalie Mariah York made 140 saves and was the Lancers' team leader in steals with 72. Lam had 62 steals in the field. Santos scored 25 of her goals in the 11 conference games and didn't become a full-time starter until later in the season. 

Pasadena opened the SCC Tournament with a 16-2 loss against Cerritos. The Lancers then advanced in the semifinal round by defeating El Camino, 8-4. Marin scored three of the team's goals as they took a 4-0 halftime lead. Marin finished with four goals and York made 13 saves.

In the fifth place final, ELAC took a 7-3 lead but the Lancers battled back to cut it to 8-7 on a goal by Grases with 34 seconds left before halftime, but did not threaten the rest of the game. PCC couldn't stop Huskies' center-forward Sophia Gonzalez who scored a match-high eight goals. Grases tallied four goals and Lam had four helpers. 

"We had a balanced scoring attack all season," said PCC head coach Terry Stoddard. "If we can bring some of our top freshmen back, I believe we can re-focus on improving our defense. Overall, it was good to see some of our young players develop like Santos and Marin. We created more chances and took more shots then many of our teams over the years."