You Can Help USA Bring Home Olympic Gold in Water Polo

If you didn't already know, California has no lack of water polo clubs. The same might apply to most areas of Florida. Basically what this mean is kids are made aware of the sport the same way kids know about baseball or football. Venture north of Florida or east of California and the game becomes a mystery. Polo? Like on horses? How do they get the horses in the water?

Before 2006, the Atlanta was all but void of water polo. An adult team existed, riding on the coat tails of a local swim club, but in more than a decade had done little to nothing to increase involvement in the sport. The team was more like an elite club, open only to those who came from somewhere else, somewhere where the sport was known. Well, as a local boy, its obvious the opportunity to play wasn't even offered to me. I found my way into the water polo 'brotherhood' by a less typical path, so I felt more inclined to give kids like me the opportunity sooner in life.

I'll spare you the details, but over the next 3 years I built up a summer league program with teams for middle school aged kids and for high school age kids; Founded, managed, and played in the Georgia high school club league; and basically created the opportunity for Atlanta kids to get involved in the sport.

Whats this got to do with the Olympics? Numbers! I'm adding numbers to the recruiting pool. The more players given the opportunity to play water polo, the more talent you'll discover. You can help too, support causes like mine. Teach kids about the sport wherever you go. Give everyone the same opportunity to play as you had. And someday the good ole U S of A will rise to glory.


Edit: I'm going to leave the text the way it originally was written, but I want to make a note that the adult team I was referring to has been very active in supporting youth water polo, and recently it has become increasingly obvious what its great support is doing for the sport in Atlanta!

USA Men's National Water Polo Team Returns Empty Handed from Europe

March 28th, after putting on a stellar clinic for high school players in the Atlanta area, the Men's National Team departed for Germany to begin their tour of Eastern Europe. The trip was made in order to play a few scrimmages against current water polo giants like Serbia and Hungary mainly for training and experience. They put up a good fight but ultimately the team, still high off their silver medal run in the summer games '08, failed to deliver in all four games.

Quoted from the USA water polo website:

"Team USA stopped first in Germany for several days of training losing to the Germans 10-6 on March 3. Rick Merlo led the scoring attack for the United States tacking on two scores while Adam Wright, Juan Delgadillo, Thomas Hopkins, and Kevin Witt all added tallies. Merrill Moses did the job in net halting 12 shots. Following their stay in Germany the team headed to Hungary to particiapte in the Volvo Cup. On March 6 the United States played Serbia falling in the match 11-5. It was the first meeting for the two since the United States' stellar victory in the semi-finals of the Olympics. Team USA then lost to Romania 8-7 on March 7 before rounding out the trip with a loss to Hungary on March 8 by a score of 13-4. The match against Hungary was a rematch of the Gold Medal game from the Olympics."


Now, I don't personally think that losing all four games is a bad sign for the silver medal squad, the whole trip was a learning experience anyway. Terry Schroeder, their head coach, is very confident in the team and continues to be optimistic. Of course he saw alot of things to improve on but also he saw many positive things happening in the water as well. Only time will tell if the US will be prepared for the World Championships, taking place this summer.