Pool play in the men's water polo competition continued on Thursday, the third day of competition. 

The day started with a contest between the U.S. and unbeaten Greece. The Greeks improved to 3-0 with a win. Here's more from the game.

Serbia's offense came back following just three goals in a loss to Australia on Tuesday, but the defense couldn't hold off a strong scoring Spanish team.

Spain's 14 goals was the most it has scored in the tournament so far. Alvaro Granados led the way with four goals, while Felipe Perrone had three.

"Serbia are a very strong team," Granados said. "They had a lot of pressure for this game and they started with an extremely hard rhythm... In the end, our tactics and our team prevailed. We're happy for the result, but being honest, I think this team has to improve a lot of things. I'm also optimistic and think we are on the correct path."

Spain had a slight 4-3 lead at the end of the first quarter. Both teams scored three goals in each in the second and third quarters in an incredibly close back-and-forth game.

In the fourth, Bernat Sanahuja and Granados scored in an 80 second span to put Spain up, 12-9, with five minutes to play. The Spanish coasted from there.

Serbia was led by Dusan Mandic with four goals to bring his total to 13 for the tournament.

With the loss, Serbia falls to 1-2. The two-time defending Olympic gold medalists are now in danger of elimination ahead of the quarterfinals. 

"In two days, the Olympics starts for us. We must win for survival. It's now or never," Mandic said. "We know the mistakes we made, and we need to eliminate them. It's as simple as that."

Serbia also lost a game in the Tokyo Olympics, and players aren't stressing about being in must-win situations.

“We now have two remaining matches that we have to win, and I think we can do it," Milos Cuk said. "We still have some things to iron out in our game, to be more precise with our defense and offense, but with this energy we will be able to do it... We need to maintain this level of aggressiveness and will in our game, but I think everything will fall into place in two days in our game against France.”

“In the last few Olympics, we were also fighting a lot in the group phase," Viktor Rasovic said. "We are not losing confidence because of this defeat. We know that we still have a big chance and we need to take it.”

Spain improves to 3-0 to stay atop the Group B standings. Even though they're unbeaten, Granados believes there is still work to be done in the final two pool play game.

“We need to adapt to this environment as the Olympic Games are not like usual games," he said. "I think we all feel that, so we need to relieve some of this pressure and play like we know how to play... We're doing great, we won three out of three games, but if we want to win these Olympics, which is our objective, we still need to improve a lot.”

MATCH STATS

Defense continues to get it done for Australia, as it has now held all three Paris opponents to single digits.

Thursday's tight battle saw the Aussies up just 1-0 at the end of the first quarter. The two teams traded goals the rest of the half, and Australia maintained a one goal lead, 4-3, at the break.

Seven of France's eight goals came during a power play. With a chance to tie the score with 4:29 remaining in the game, a penalty shot by Thomas Vernoux was saved by Australia's Nic Porter, one of his 10 saves on the night.

Milos Maksimovic was tied for a game-high with three goals, the only Aussie to find the net more than once. France's Ugo Crousillat and Emil Bjorch also had three scores.

Australia improves to 2-1 in France and moves into second in the Group A standings. France falls to 1-2.

MATCH STATS

For the second straight game, Montenegro has lost in a penalty shootout. The two teams were tied at the end of the first, second, third, and fourth quarters to force penalties with the score even at 7-7.

Both teams made their first penalty shot. On the second, Italy's Andrea Fondelli put through his shot, and Italian goalie Marco Del Lungo stopped Marko Mrsic's to give Italy the advantage. After both squads also missed their third and fourth shots, it was Italy's Francesco Condemi who came through with the game-winner on the fifth and final chance.

Francesco Di Fulvio and Gonzalo Echeniquev led Italy with two goals each. Vlado Popadic had a game-high three scores for Montenegro, and Dusan Matkovic added two.

Italy, this year's world champions, stays unbeaten and tied with Greece at the top of the Group A standings with two games remaining. Montenegro (0-3) will likely have to win its final two games to try to sneak into the quarterfinals. They're sitting in fifth out of six teams, with the top four moving on.

Croatia didn't score at all in the fourth quarter on Thursday, but three goals in each of the first and second quarters and five more the third built enough of a cushion that it didn't matter.

The Croatian defense held Romania scoreless in the opening frame and to just one goal in the fourth. Keeper Marco Bijac had 11 saves in the win.

Loren Fatovic, Maro Jokovic, and Jerko Marinic Kragic had two goals each for Croatia. Andrei-Tudor Fulea and Andrei Tepelus also had two goals apiece for Romania.

Croatia picked up a much-needed win to jump ahead of the U.S. into third place in the Pool A standings with two games remaining. Wineless Romania (0-3) is now in must-win territory with games against top-ranked Italy and Montenegro remaining.

MATCH STATS

Hungary had scored just 22 goals combined coming into Thursday's matchup with Japan, and nearly matched that in one game. The Hungarians scored five goals in each of the first and fourth quarters for a runaway win.

Eleven different players found the scoresheet for Hungary. Vince Pal Vigvari led the way with four goals. Denes Varga added three, and Marton Vamos had two. Japan has now allowed a tournament-worst 47 goals in three games. No other team has allowed more than 39.

Not only was the offense on fire, Hungary's defense also held down a Japan team that had previously scored 13 and 15 goals in their prior games. Yusuke Inaba - the tournaments leading scorer with 12 goals coming into Thursday - had a tournament-low two goals against the Hungarians. Taiyo Watanaba led Japan with three scores.

With the win, Hungary stays in second in the Group B standings. Japan, despite being the second highest scoring team in Paris - falls to 0-3 and is last in Group B.

MATCH STATS