Aug. 21, 2007

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. - The 2007 UC Santa Barbara men's water polo team has been picked to finish seventh out of nine teams in the annual preseason poll conducted by the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation coaches.

The Gauchos, who will be entering their third season under head coach Wolf Wigo, finished fifth in the league in 2006. UCSB returns every key player from a team that went 21-14 overall and 3-5 in the MPSF, including Third Team All-American Ross Sinclair and All-MPSF selection Zsombor Vincze.

Santa Barbara opens the reguar season on Sept. 1-2, when it travels to La Jolla, Calif., to take part in the UC San Diego Triton Invitational.

For the third straight year, USC was selected to finish first by the coaches. The Trojans received five first-place votes. Cal was picked second and UCLA third.

2007 Mountain Pacific Sports Federation
Men's Water Polo Coaches Poll

Rank  Team               Points
No. 1 USC  (5)           59 points
No. 2 California (2)     53 points
No. 3 UCLA (1)           47 points
No. 4 UC Irvine (1)      45 points
No. 5 Stanford           41 points
No. 6 Pepperdine         34 points
No. 7 UC Santa Barbara   20 points
No. 8 Long Beach State   14 points
No. 9 Pacific            11 points
Note: (First-place votes)