The men’s water polo team went down swinging against the Orange Coast College Pirates on Wednesday. After a rough second half, the game ended in a loss, 13-14 in overtime.

The Hornets were feeling confident battling the Pirates after a 15-6 win against Santa Ana in their last game.

The Hornets hoped to continue the lead on the scoreboard instead of having to fight their way through a tough over time defeat according to Joe Feaster, a sophomore who scored four goals.

“All it takes is effort. We started out really good and by the second half, we became less intense,” Feaster said. “We let the score get in the way of our motivation and we just weren’t working as hard as we should have been all the way through.”

The game started out strong for the Hornets despite a goal from Orange Coast within the first two minutes. Soon after, Feaster came in with his own goal to give Fullerton the motivation to start racking up points. By the end of the first quarter, they were ahead 4-3.

The Hornets’ defense was hard at work to keep Orange Coast from scoring in the second quarter. They managed to keep the Pirates at bay for the entire quarter. The hard work paid off with an ending score of 7-3. It looked like it was going to be an easy sweep for the Hornets in the second half.

Goalkeeper, Sam Feaster, was hard at work to allow as few goals as possible from OCC during a rough second half.

“To me, there was a lack of motivation today. We are a talented team going up against another great team and we didn’t live up to our potential,” he said. “We did great in the first half then lost mentality in the second.”

The third and fourth quarters proved to be a challenge when the Hornets slowed down, with their defense not working well together during the second half.

OCC began their comeback especially after their goalie took a shoot from across the pool and scored. What seemed like a giant lead for Fullerton quickly became 9-6 in the third quarter and tying 11-11 in the fourth quarter.

The game went into overtime and the Hornets realized they needed to bring back the drive from the first half in order to fight for the win. Fullerton was able to get a goal but OCC’s communication and defense proved to be just what they needed to win the game.

Assistant Coach, Brandon Loveless, knows that the team can make a comeback regardless of the close loss.

“We definitely need to work on control obviously from what happened in the second half,” Loveless said. “We still need a lot of practice for this weekend”

The Hornets head to Santa Monica on Friday for the Santa Monica Tournament and will be back at home on Saturday as they host Fullerton’s Mini Tournament.