Natalie Peng‘s pair of goals led the Cerritos women’s water polo team in a narrow 6-4 victory over conference rivals Long Beach on Wednesday.

Playing in front of a packed house, it was a close, physical contest, but the Falcons were able to take an early 2-1 lead after the first quarter and hold on until the final whistle.

The win pushed the Falcons’ record to 6-0 in conference and 25-1 overall, while Long Beach dropped to 5-1 in conference play.

With a boisterous crowd to cheer them on, the Falcons jumped out to an early lead courtesy of a goal from Peng, followed by a shot from 15 meters out by Crystle Casarez.

“This was the biggest turnout we’ve ever had,” Peng pointed out.

“It pumped us up to hear all the cheering. It’s nice to have that kind of support.”

The two sides traded goals in the second quarter. Peng’s second goal of the day was matched by Kimberly Briggs to make the score a meager 3-2 at the half.

The Falcons extended their lead to 4-2 in the third quarter off of an Angie Silva goal, but the Vikings pulled back within one with only 12 seconds left thanks to a goal from Alexandria Blank.

In the final quarter, goals from Cerritos’ Raquel Gabayeron and Long Beach’s Kimmy Morrison kept the game within one point before Yvonne Ruvalcaba put the game out of reach.

Ruvalcaba entered the game with only three minutes remaining and scored with 1:27 to play, and then came up with a crucial steal on the next possession to keep the score line at 6-4.

“Yvonne scoring that goal at the end, that was big,” exclaimed head coach Sergio Macia.

I loved that it was a low-scoring game. It’s hard to protect a small lead like that, but we did,” he added.

It took hard-nosed defense, superb goalkeeping, and a little luck from both teams to keep the score so low.

Falcons goalie Miranda Bakke and Vikings goalie Chelsea Datt recorded eight saves a piece, but the best defender of the game might have been the goal frame.

Shots from both squads repeatedly hit the post, keeping the tide of the game from turning in the favor of either team.

“Some of the women think that every shot needs to be perfect. They want every shot to be bar-in,” explained Long Beach head coach Chris Oeding.

When I see that we went four for 23 in shooting it tells me that we had an off-day. Creating that many opportunities is a positive, the shots were just off,” he added.

Macias also believes that were it not for a few more conversions, the game would have been completely different.

“What kept the game close was us not converting. If we would have converted better, we wouldn’t have had to work as hard as we did,” Macias said.

Their defense challenged our shooters and we threw away a lot of shots which gave them confidence,” he added.

The win for Cerritos sets up a potential championship meeting in next week’s Southern California regional playoffs. The Falcons go in as the No. 1 seed, and Long Beach enters the tournament as the No. 2 seed.

With a number of potential meetings to look forward to, both teams expect nothing short of more close contests.

“It was an exciting game to be a part of, but we still have to beat them when it counts,” Peng pointed out.