Team USA’s Men counted a loss against Montenegro on the fourth day of competition. McQuin Baron (North Tustin, CA/Mater Dei HS/United) tallied 4 saves and shared time in net with Jon Sibley (Lafayette, CA/California/Lamorinda), who totaled 6 saves. Tomorrow’s game against China will be streamed live at 3:30am and can be accessed by clicking here (Dubai TV).
Team USA had a quiet first quarter, while Montenegro scored twice. At the start of the second quarter, down 2-0, captain John Mann (Newport Beach, CA/California/NYAC) put Team USA on the board. Following Mann, Alex Bowen (Santee, CA/Stanford/Stanford) was the last to score for either team with over a minute of play left.
The second half started with Team USA down, 4-2, the third quarter again scoreless for Team USA, while Montenegro secured their lead with three more goals, increasing their lead, 7-2. During the fourth quarter, Bret Bonanni (Huntington Beach, CA/Stanford/Stanford) was able to capitalize on a power play and scored from deep left. Anthony Daboub (Newport Beach, CA/UCLA/Bruin) scored his first goal of the tournament, well into the fourth quarter. Montenegro scored three in the final period, winning the game, 10-4.
Dejan Udovicic (SRB) – USA Head Coach
“This is the worst way you can lose a game because we did not play anything. This is terrible. This is our worst performance of the tournament today. We must change. Yes, we have 10 guys from college. Nobody cares about this. I don’t care about this. There is no reason to play like this today.”
John Mann (USA) — Captain
“I think we didn’t execute very well; that was the bad part of it. Obviously we’re growing as a team; we can’t come out like that so we have to play a higher level and come back tomorrow and improve. I don’t think you can ever be satisfied with yourself; you have to keep improving. There’s so many things we need to work on. Obviously this is not the result we were looking for so we have to keep driving and growing.”
Match 13: 14:30, Quarterfinal, MONTENEGRO 10 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 4
Quarters: 2-0, 2-2, 3-0, 3-2
Referees: Sergio Borrell (ESP), Vojin Putnikivic (SRB).
Extra Man: MNE: 3/6. USA: 3/5
Pens: None
Teams:
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: McQuin Baron, Nick Bell, Alex Obert, Michael Rosenthal, Anthony Daboub (1), Conner Cleary, Josh Samuels, Bret Bonanni (1), Alex Bowen (1), Nolan McConnell, Jackson Kimbell, John Mann (1), Jon Sibley. Head Coach: Dejan Udovicic.
MONTENEGRO: Zdravko Radic, Drasko Brguljan (2), Vjekoslav Paskovic (2), Antonio Petrovic, Darko Brguljan (1), Dragan Draskovic, Mladan Janovic (4), Uros Cuckovic (1), Jovan Saric, Nikola Murisic, Filip Klikovac, Predrag Jokic, Milos Scepanovic. Head Coach: Ranko Perovic.
Water Polo News / Swimming News courtesy of USA Water Polo.
Montenegro is country of 600,000 people.
Can’t keep doing the same thing and expect different results… Coaching needs to be revamped, players changed up, and outmoded style of play reformed to be competitive. Seems like the same story playing again over and over for USA Water Polo, which is unfortunate. There are a couple very promising young goalkeepers coming up that may stem some bleeding. One of them 6’8″ with a huge wingspan. The “Caleb Dressel” of water polo keepers. We’ll have to see.