Go Knights Polo!

Alex decided to start his freshman year of high school by playing on the water polo team. It is a young team and a small team - when the season started, they didn't even have enough boys to make a full team, but after a few weeks they were able to recruit a few more so they could actually play games with other schools. The good part about being on a small team is that everyone gets to play a lot, which was really a great experience for Alex.

Many of the boys have never played water polo before this season. It was actually quite fun to watch the boys improve as they learned, and to see their teamwork get better and better as the season went on. We noticed that they actually were very competitive score-wise, and were even sometimes ahead, during the first half of the games, but their scores would start falling behind in the last half as the boys got tired and didn't have a big enough team for fresh replacements. Teams that were 3 times the size had 3 fresh teams throughout a game.

They did win their first game near the end of the season. Alex was so proud and couldn't stop talking about it.

Their last game was at my own alma mater - Indio High School, in the same pool I have spent many hours splashing around myself. Weird to see my own kid competing in my old pool!

Earlier in the season we played Indio and lost something like 24:2, but this time they only lost something like 12:5 - so they doubled their scores and cut the other teams goals in half. Now that is real improvement, I'd say!

Next year, if they can recruit more players (Nate will be there!), I think they will really be surprised at how well they will do!

In the above picture Alex (#10) assists in a goal by grabbing the ball and throwing it immediately right to Jake Orduno, who scored! Great play, Alex! After, his amazing coach, Michelle, congratulates him on a good play.

Alex wasn't so sure he wanted to play water polo, but did finally take the plunge, and it has been such a great move for him. I have seen his confidence really soar this season, not only in polo, but in many other areas of his life, like taekwando. He is starting, for the first time in his life, to think of himself as an athlete, which is huge for him. (Back when Alex had that same kind of Ah-HA moment about school and being an academic in middle school - his grades went from bad to nearly perfect.) We have learned that when Alex decides he wants to do something, he does it, so he might just decide that he wants to be a great polo player and do what it takes to get there.

And Alex has worked HARD! Water Polo is a difficult, exhausting sport, and they practice for hours every day. Alex has lost at least 10 lbs during the season! That is impressive and an indication of how hard he is working. (And he has trademark crispy hair, red eyes, and usually reeks of chlorine - ah, the joys of aquatic athletics.)

On the day after the last game, they had an informal awards ceremony at the pool. Each boys got a certificate of participation. When it was Alex' turn, coach Michelle said that unfortunately it wasn't until late in the season that they learned the secret to Alex's success - candy! Lots of it right before a game (which makes sense, because sugar makes him aggressive. Too much and he really starts picking on his brothers. We knew he had the aggression in him, the trick was how to get him to transfer his aggression from his poor brothers to the other team. Candy, that's how.)

What a great bunch of boys we have on that team - and 3 of them (that's like a third of the team) are LDS, which is fun. After the awards the whole team, including the coach got in the pool for one of their favorite practice games, 2 on 2. It was fun watching them play and laugh together.

Water polo really is a fun sport, and like Alex says, when he sees those poor football players out there sweating it out in heavy gear on a miserable hot desert day, he knows he is in the right place!