BRIDGEPORT, Pa. — Princeton University’s Emese Batizi (So., Budapest, Hungary/Szent István Gimnázium) and Hungary built an 11-4 halftime lead on the way to dispatching Australia during the fourth day of competition at the 2025 World Aquatics Women’s U20 Water Polo Championships in Salvador, Brazil.
The victory advances Hungary into the U20 Championship semifinals where the team will face Spain at 5:30 p.m. local/4:30 p.m. Eastern on Thursday, August 14. In other quarterfinal competition, the United States of America will face Croatia at 4:00 p.m./3:00 p.m., the Netherlands meets Italy at 7:00 p.m./6:00 p.m. and Greece battles Brazil at 8:30 p.m./7:30 p.m.
The winners of the USA-vs.-Croatia and Netherlands-vs.-Italy games will return to the water at 7:00 p.m./6:00 p.m. on Friday, August 15 in the first semifinal, while the victors of the Spain-vs.-Hungary and Greece-vs.-Brazil games will square-off at 8:30 p.m./7:30 p.m. in the second semifinal.
Batizi, who shot one-for-two on action shots in an 11-10 opening game loss to the United States of America on Sunday, August 10, before converting one-of-two shots as Hungary took a 9-8 setback versus Italy on Monday, August 11, and not factoring on the offensive end of the tank in a 15-11 defeat by Greece on Tuesday, August 12, notched statistics on both ends of the pool versus Australia.
She shot zero-for-two in the game with a pair of misses on six-meter chances, dished out an assist and snagged a pair of steals to help Hungary outscore Australia 5-2 and 6-2 in the first two quarters, respectively.
The Aussies chipped away at their deficit by notching 4-3 scoring outcomes in the third and fourth quarters to close the final gap to five goals.
All matches for the 2025 World Aquatics Women’s Junior World Championships are scheduled to stream live on the World Aquatics YouTube site. Live statistics and postgame box scores are available from MicroPlus Timing Services.
Batizi is making her sixth appearance on the international stage after earning roster spots on Hungary’s U14 (2018-19), U15 (2019-20), U17 (2021-22) and U19 (2023-24) teams.
During her inaugural season at Princeton, Batizi appeared in 25 games, recording 26 goals, 25 assists and 22 steals as the Tigers finished the season as the runner-up at the Collegiate Water Polo Association (CWPA) Championship.
