This post was written by Hatchet staff writer Nora Princiotti.
The women’s water polo team may have shut the door on its chance to play in the postseason Sunday, completing a disappointing weekend of play at the Collegiate Water Polo Association Southern Division Championships in which they went 1-2.
GW placed fifth out of six teams in the tournament, falling to both Princeton and Harvard Saturday, while narrowly defeating sixth-seeded Mercyhurst in the fifth-place game Sunday morning.
The Colonials find out Monday if they will receive an at-large bid for the CWPA Championships, though head coach Scott Reed called the team’s chances “slim to none.”
“It was definitely not what we hoped to accomplish this weekend,” Reed said.
In some ways the weekend went as expected – GW was seeded fifth when play opened Saturday afternoon – but the lack of scoring was particularly disappointing.
The Colonials were plagued by a feeble offense which shot a dismal 18 percent through their three weekend games.
“It was really tough to overcome some poor shooting on our part,” Reed said. “It was just a bad, bad shooting weekend.”
The Colonials didn’t score until the fourth quarter in Saturday’s opener against top-seeded Princeton, eventually dropping the game 16-2. The two GW goals came from freshmen Ally Bakos and Maddy Johnson, but again, were far too late in the game to have any impact. Goalkeepers Chandler Vilander and Caterina Sesana combined for just five saves in the game, unable to stop the barrage of the Tiger offense.
Reed said his team struggled to shake off that loss going into the ensuing afternoon game against Harvard. They tightened up, he said, and let their offensive struggles continue, falling to the Crimson 12-3.
“When it becomes harder and harder to put those balls in the net, we tend to try harder and harder, and sometimes it creates some easy opportunities for the other team, especially in the transition game,” Reed said.
Johnson remained consistent for the Colonials, tallying a goal in the afternoon game, while sophomore Hannah Cox scored GW’s other two unnoticed goals. It was a blowout that Reed said came from a lack of focus on the tournament’s bigger stage.
“It’s a matter of focusing on what you need to do and how you shoot the ball, but it’s a big weekend, it’s really hard to do that and focus on those things,” Reed said.
In the final game, senior Megan Brolley led a Colonials surge after GW surrendered an early 6-4 lead to the Lakers and found themselves down 7-6 with two minutes to play. Brolley tied the score at seven with one-minute left to play and scored again with 14 seconds remaining to help her team avoid a last-place finish at the Championships.
“On the defensive side of things we had a lot of off opportunities and it was one of those things where we were still struggling offensively” Reed said. “But we were able to grind out the eight goals that we needed to win the game.”
Brolley, who added four steals against Mercyhurst, is part of a senior core of players who have led the team all season long.
“The seniors, as always, made some very good contributions,” Reed said. “It’s an emotional time without a doubt, but they’ve put everything that they could into it.”
It’s likely that group will have played their last collegiate games, especially after Bucknell – who the Colonials topped 8-7 during the regular season – upset Harvard to gain ground in the Southern Division standings.
The Colonials finish the regular season with a 12-15 overall record.
