As water polo rebuilds, one tournament can help bring it back to prominence in Stanislaus County
Turlock High’s Brey Pierce and Lia Romeo were underclassmen the last time they had a full water polo season.
Pierce, a sophomore, and Romeo, a freshman, were swimming and playing water polo almost every day and then everything just stopped.
“We shut down in the middle of swim season my sophomore year,” Pierce, now a senior, said about the COVID-19 shutdown. “Then we didn’t get back in the pool, until like March of this year.”
There are no doubts that when the pandemic first started more than 18 months ago, high school sports were largely impacted.
Football had a shortened five-game season. Volleyball played a six-week season. Basketball’s was was about a month-and-a-half as well. All in the spring.
Water Polo was hit extremely hard prior to the spring season when pools across Stanislaus County shut down, and it’s been in a slow recovery ever since.
Coaches and players detailed what the journey back has been like ahead of the two-day 43rd Western States Tournament, which starts Friday and pits about 40 varsity and junior varsity girls teams playing in several pools throughout Stanislaus and San Joaquin counties.
“Water Polo has been hit, probably more than anything else,” said Johansen High water polo coach and 2001 USA Water Polo Hall of Fame inductee Brent Bohlender. “Basketball, you can always go out shoot hoops. Baseball you’ve got a field. Football, you can go throw the ball. But in water polo, you’re not in a pool. So you’re basically at a disadvantage.”
Those who didn’t have a pool in their back yard or access to a 25-yard regulation pool could not train properly. Not only did the shutdown stunt conditioning, but it slowed young player’s development in a sport where pool time is critical.
Would there be a 2020 season?
Then, there was a big question of whether there would be a 2020 season at all, causing further disruption.
“We would practice for a week, and then it would get shut down ... and then maybe we get to go back for a couple more days, and the same routine would happen over and over,” said Davis High girls water polo junior captain Olivia Beebe.
School districts went back and forth between practices and shut downs, like many other sports, but for water polo athletes, getting proper conditioning, the No. 1 priority in all sports, was the ultimate struggle without a pool.
“You can’t get the same conditioning that you would for water polo or swim, outside of the water,” Romeo, a junior, said. “You were still working out, but then once you got back in the pool, you were in land shape and not water shape.”
To stay in the water and keep competing at their sport, some students took different measures.
“We had some athletes go all the way down to San Diego and then still zoom with our school, because that was allowed,” said Turlock High coach Anne Cornell. “Kids did go and find other pools, and they did what they could to stay in shape. They were swimming club or playing club (water polo) with whoever would let them play.”
There was a shortened season for Stanislaus District athletes.
Local numbers are soft
The pandemic hit at a time water polo participation was growing. The state high schools saw a 7.4% increase in girls plays and 5% increase in boys in the last two years leading up to the pandemic, according to the California Interscholastic Federation annual participation census data.
But without access to facilities to keep a full season going last year, water polo participation, at least anecdotally, has seen a drop this year, according to several Modesto-area coaches and players.
“Our numbers are still sitting at about 15 to 16 Girls,” said Cornell. “Normally we’ve had about 20 or 21, so we’ve gone down a little bit.
“Many schools do not even have a JV girls or JV boys program so that’s affecting the programs when they get to the varsity level as well.”
This year, they had a full season for the first time since 2019 and that includes the Western States. The well-known tournament has featured former Olympians and seen teams come from as far as Oregon to compete.
“If you want to go and play college ball, it’s where you want the recruiters to see you play so that you get some exposure.” said Cornell, whose team will compete this weekend.
This year, the oldest girls water polo tournament in the United States sees teams from around Northern California. Varsity host sites include Downey, Johansen, Oakdale and Ripon while junior varsity games will be at Enochs and Pitman.
The Western States and next week’s boys DeLong Tournament are two big ways to help the sport re-gain the numbers it had before in Stanislaus County.
The rebirth of water polo begins with the youth.
Successful programs start kids swimming anywhere from 8 to 10 years old and get them exposed to water polo shortly after, but when the shut down happened, numbers in the area dropped dramatically.
As the sports world starts to return to a bit of normalcy, area water polo coaches have started to see a rise in numbers among the younger kids, but they feel there is still more work to be done.
“It’s going to take us as coaches and our players and word of mouth to encourage kids to come back ... and get the parents to believe in us,” Cornell said.
Numbers improving at Davis High
Against the current trend, a glimmer of hope shines in the Davis High program. Beebe says that when she first started, the team barely had enough people for subs during a game but now, they have the most players since she’s been there.
“I would always talk to my friends about water polo, and how much fun it was,” Beebe said. “I think that’s what really broadened people’s mindset about playing the sport and trying out for it.”
Players are going to lead the charge in bringing their peers back to the sport and Pierce and Romeo have their water polo sales pitches ready to go.
“I’ve always done swim my whole life but then finding out about water polo, it’s such a draw of competitiveness that I really enjoy,” Romeo said. “It’s a physically excruciating sport and it’s really hard, but the reward you get from it really pays off in the end.”
Said Pierce: “There’s always a different way you have to play against a different team and there’s ways that you have to run plays depending on whatever team you’re playing. It’s always different, no matter what you’re doing.”
This story was originally published October 15, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
