This Saturday the No. 2 Stanford women’s water polo team takes on the No.1 USC Trojans in its final game of the 2010 regular season. The stakes for Saturday’s contest are high, with the Mountain Pacific Sports Feder

ation (MPSF) regular season title and the No. 1 seed at the MPSF Tournament going to the winner.

However, expect the ladies to be primed as the game doubles as Senior Day and several of the women will be receiving recognition as graduating seniors. Alex Koran, Jessica Steffens, Kelly Eaton and Kelsey Holshouser will be honored as the Card’s four graduating players before taking to the pool at 4 p.m. on Saturday. Dubbed in press releases as the “Clash of the Titans,” the women will undoubtedly be looking for a little bit of revenge, as it was the Trojans who defeated the Cardinal at the UC-Irvine Invitational earlier in the year to jump ahead of Stanford for the No. 1 ranking.

When interviewed after the tournament in Irvine, senior two-meter Jessica Steffens said, “We will be looking forward to the next chance we get to play USC down the road. We know we can beat them and will be excited to play them again.”

This is a perfect opportunity for not only Steffens and the other seniors, but also the entire squad to get another crack at the Trojans before heading to the postseason.

The Cardinal (21-1, 6-0 MPSF) continued its undefeated run in MPSF play last Saturday at Avery Aquatic Center, winning its 10th consecutive Big Splash against California with a dramatic, last-second 8-7 victory over the Golden Bears. The teams battled back and forth the entire duration of the contest, playing to a 7-7 stalemate until Steffens fired home from about eight meters with one second remaining to clinch the victory. Junior driver Kim Krueger also scored twice for the Cardinal, while junior goaltender Amber Oland made seven saves and held California scoreless in the final period.

USC (19-1, 5-0 MPSF) will play its final two regular-season contests this weekend, facing off against San Jose State this afternoon before the big clash at Stanford Saturday. The Women of Troy will bring their 17-game winning streak to the Bay Area this weekend. USC, last year’s national runner-up, is led by the play of Joelle Bekhazi (40 goals) and Kally Lucas (32), while in the cage Tumua Anae leads the MPSF with 9.95 saves per game and allows just 4.60 goals per game.

The Stanford-USC rivalry is just as fierce in the pool as it is on the football, baseball and soccer fields, as over the past three seasons (including 2010) the schools have fought to a near standstill in women’s water polo. In 2008, the teams split four meetings, but the Women of Troy got the upper hand with wins at the MPSF Tournament and NCAA Championships, while last season, USC won three of the four meetings including the two tournament wins. So far this year, the teams have each won a match, and have been the only two schools to be ranked No. 1 this season. Saturday’s regular season finale could very well not be the last meeting of the two schools this season, but it will go a long way toward determining the postseason paths of each team.

The Card is riding a wave of confidence from the Big Splash as the senior class played a major role in carrying the women over Cal in perhaps their closest game of the year. They look to carry that momentum into their contest with the Trojans this Saturday. The game will start at 4 p.m. at Avery Aquatic Center.