WHITTIER, Calif. (Oct. 29, 2025) – Junior center
Pedro Carvalho (São Paulo, Brazil / Colegio Dantes Alighieri / Golden West College) and the Whittier College mens' water polo team started fast and were able to leverage that into a huge SCIAC win over Chapman University on Wednesday evening.
The Poets entered Wednesday's game tied with the Panthers in the SCIAC standings, making this particular matchup extra pivotal for SCIAC Postseason Tournament considerations. The Poets responded with 11 first-half goals, their most in any SCIAC game this season with all four of Carvalho's goals coming within that span.
Collectively, Whittier played an extremely unselfish game, assisting on 14 of 18 goals and doing the little things necessary defensively to take some pressure off sophomore goalkeeper
Lorenzo Angelucci (Pescara, Italy / Serie B). Angelucci stopped seven shots, putting some of his early-season form on display as he helped neutralized the Panthers' offense. Sophomore center
Noah Bigara (Cape Town, South Africa / Pinnacle Schools) came up big in assisting Angelucci, and got involved offensively as always with four goals and four drawn exclusions.
The fast start kept the Panthers on their back foot throughout the game's duration, and the visitors were never quite able to find an offensive rhythm. With Chapman having to open up the offense late in the game, this allowed the Poets to apply their own offensive pressure even as the Panthers began to mount a small comeback. Senior
Jaime Ariste (Madrid, Spain / South Eugene / Westcliff University | CIS Endicott International) rounded out scoring by leading the Poets with five goals, while sophomore attacker
Zander Montoya (La Verne, Calif. / Damien) took on a more facilitatory role in Wednesday's win with two goals to go with a team-high five assists. One of those goals came on a five-meter penalty shot.
Head Coach Preslav Djippov and the Poets will next take on the SCIAC powerhouse No. 2 Claremont-Mudd-Scripps Colleges on the road this coming Saturday, Nov. 11.
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