Polo hosts Cactus Classic

The Arizona men’s water polo club held its annual Cactus Classic at the Student Recreation Center pool this weekend, an invitational tournament that matched the Wildcats against adult masters teams from across the Southwest. Arizona’s A-team placed fourth out of 11 teams, and the B-team placed ninth.

Because masters teams are non-collegiate adult clubs, the tournament did have any bearing on Arizona’s record or ranking. Team president Alex Kane said the exhibition gave Arizona an opportunity to test its skills against craftier competition during the run-up to the Southwest Conference Finals at the end of October.

“”The thing with the master’s teams are that they’re much larger and much more knowledgeable players than what we face in club tournaments,”” Kane said. “”The word we use is that they have ‘old man strength.’ They’re a lot bigger than us, which comes with age, but they’re much slower. We had to use our speed to beat them.””

The A-team started Friday with a 14-11 loss against the Newport Masters out of California. The A-team won the rest of its games, defeating the Arizona Alumni team 11-9 on Saturday and scraping out a 9-8 overtime victory against the Vegas Masters.

The B-team played a number of tough games but won only its opener, 12-10, against Old Pueblo. The B-team played to an 8-8 draw with the Vegas Masters and lost to the RSOS

Masters 16-11 on Saturday. Sunday saw the B-team losing two tight games, 12-11 against the Arizona Alumni team and 10-9 to the Utah Masters in overtime.

Overall, Kane said he was happy with how the weekend went.

“”Our game plan going in was to get as many players playing time as possible, and we think that everyone had a really positive, productive weekend,”” he said. “”We’re happy the way the weekend went, and we’re ready for conference finals.””

The Southwest Conference Finals are to be held Oct. 27-28 at the Hillenbrand Aquatic Center and the Student Recreation Center pool.

Arizona men’s rugby opens season with win

The Arizona rugby men’s club team began its 2007-2008 campaign with a 53-8 victory at home over Clemson on Sunday.

Team president Kevin Hills said he was impressed with the way the Wildcats came out of the gate.

“”This is the first time since I’ve been here that we’ve played this well in our first game of the season,”” he said.

Fullback Tim Moxness opened up Arizona’s scoring attack, earning a hat trick with three tries in the first 25 minutes and helping Arizona jump out to a 22-3 halftime lead at halftime. Moxness scored 23 of Arizona’s points.

Four Wildcats added five more scores in the second half. Wing Dan Hafner, lock David Samons, center Kevin Harrison and flanker Sean O’Sullivan all added to the tally.

Hills said Clemson may have been tired from a Friday game against ASU and a training session it held Saturday.

“”We were definitely a little more dominant,”” he said. “”We executed a lot better and our skills were lot better, and in the long run, that translates into more scores in rugby.””