The water polo team played in their final tournament of the year this weekend, winning the 2018 CWPA New York State Championships in the second bracket. The Continentals performed well in all three of their games against tough competition. Captain Frankie Hearne ’19 said, “The Hamilton College water polo team excelled at our final tournament of the year. The resounding victories we achieved at our final tournament was a result of hard work by our veterans and new players alike.”
The team was able to defeat the Raiders of Colgate University 18–1, with goals from David Gagnidze ’20, Caroline Paulson ’21, and Ben Kaplan ’21. This blowout victory was a confidence-boosting win to start of the tournament. However, Hearne thought that the 15–6 win against Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) was the most impressive, saying, “Our strongest showing was against our D3 rivals RPI. Our team came together and played Hamilton’s brand of shutdown defense to claim the game.”
The third win of the weekend was another dominant one, a 14-point defeat of Buffalo University by a score of 18–4. The undefeated weekend capped off an already successive season. The final game featured goals in the final quarter from Jake Lowry ’19 and SJ Bennett ’22.
Two standout players from the weekend were undoubtedly Spencer Dutton ’20 and Evan Tatro ’20, each of whom had 15 goals over the 3 games.
For the graduating members of the team, it was a weekend to remember. “[The seniors] enjoyed excellent tournament to end their college water polo careers,” said Hearne, adding that being able to do it all in the home pool added an additional degree of meaning to the achievement.
The team is primed to maintain its success next year with many key players returning to Hamilton. Hearne had this to say of the team’s future: “Co-Captains Tatro and Chris Wan look to lead the team to even greater heights next year with fellow junior and left sniper Spencer Dutton.” Hearne also anticipates improvement from younger players as they make the transition to becoming veteran water polo players, highlighting up-and-comers of the team. “Both Valentin Scognamillo ’21 and David Gagnidze ’20 enjoyed strong showings at their second state tournaments and newcomers Kaplan, Caroline Paulson ’21, S.J. Bennett ’22, Claire Goldstein ’22, and Annie Danielson ’22 improved drastically during their first years playing water polo.”
The future looks bright for the Continentals water polo team as they will continue to improve through the offseason until next year. The team has worked incredibly hard to learn the game from scratch and to become successful players in such a short period of time. This makes the team’s performance all the more impressive, as a number of the players have never played the sport before. Yet, they have the endurance to play entire games and have impressive wins alongside learning the rules and rhythm of water polo.
The Continentals will be ready to show how much they have improved next year just as they did this year. Hearne lauded the team’s season, saying, “Overall Hamilton College enjoyed another strong season of water polo and appreciated the opportunity to host the New York State Championships once again.” The water polo team has done a fantastic job to develop students to play to the best of their ability, and it will be exciting to see how the team does next year.
