Big Green Only Obstacle in Water Polo's Triumphant Weekend

Author: Whitney Sones

The Women's Water Polo Club had a winning weekend in Worcester, Mass. at a tournament held at Holy Cross this past weekend. The ladies found themselves outmatched when they faced up against a tough Dartmouth College team. The game had notable marks on defense and some all around high quality play in the first half. This game was the only loss out of four games in the tournament

Following the expected defeat from Dartmouth, the Panther ladies gained ground against the home team of Holy Cross with top scorers captain Kate Salstein '02.5 and Jen Watters '03 having six and four goals respectively.

The rookie of the weekend most definitely would be Karen Lee '05, who was a solid scorer and also made significant steals throughout the weekend. With a final score of 11-7, it was a very respectable win.

Saturday's last game had the Panthers going head to head with the school's long time rival, Williams. For the first three quarters of the game, although it was a reasonably close match, Middlebury was always ahead by at least two goals. But in the fourth quarter the Ephs to tied up the score and sent the game into overtime.

Then, because neither team scored in the two three-minute quarters in overtime, the game then went into sudden death double overtime, with the match going to the first team to score. And with less than a minute remaining in the game until it became a shootout, Whitney Sones '05 gave an assist to Watters, who, with injured shoulders and all, scored the winning goal of the game, thus beating Williams. The catch phrase from Watters regarding the game was, "I just had to beat Williams in one sport before I graduate." Being a member of the women's swim team, this statement held especially true to her as well as her fellow water polo teammates who were also from the swim team (Sarah Schaffer '03 and Sones). The final score of the game was 10-9, Middlebury.

On Sunday the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth was met with a very strong team of Panthers. With a final score of 16-3 Middlebury, the winning game was pretty self-explanatory to both teams. The Panthers tried out some new plays that were successful in scoring goals, and both lefties, Schaffer and Sones, were able to score, an uncharacteristic occurrence next to the usual scorers, Salstein and Watters. In that game alone Salstein managed to score seven times on goal.

Over the course of the two-day tournament, the goalie, Sarah Weston '03 got very high marks for her protection of the net. She had numerous blocked shots and had a genuine presence in the water. Margot Herwood '03 was an essential player as the "hole set" who was the backbone of the offensive set up, as well as being the key "sprinter" getting the ball in the start of every quarter that she had that position. As team captain Salstein said, "This is the first year that we have ever played together as a real team, all helping each other and playing as one group." Well done, Panthers; the Middlebury women's water polo club definitely had its day in the sun at this tournament in Worcester.