Sophomore center Catie Tuning is excited for the first home game of the season for the women’s water polo team, while sophomore Derek Klotzer enters the men’s water polo game with a sense of confidence as both the women and men’s water polo teams face Los Angeles Trade-Tech in back-to-back home games on Wednesday.
Coming off this past weekend’s events at the Chaffey tournament, the women’s water polo team holds an overall record of 3-6 and are looking ahead at a game that women’s head water polo coach Sergio Macias is calling a “must win”.
“It’s our first conference home game. We just came off our best performance on Saturday, so we want to carry over from that game and hopefully do the same, if not better from our most recent game in Fresno.”
Macias noted that the team is still adjusting to one another and that it’s working on the basics in order to refine its game against opponents like the one they have on Wednesday.
“Los Angeles Trade-Tech is undefeated. They’re 2-0 and they scored 30 goals in two games. It doesn’t matter who they played against, they scored 30 goals so that means they’re not scared to shoot.”
Tuning added, “We need to go over the game plan and do everything together as a team.”
The men’s water polo team holds a 3-3 record, right at .500, and seeks to limit its mistakes, most prominently on the offensive side of things as the offense has been described as reckless.
“As long as we have our counter-attack before we pass the ball and make sure nobody is dropping off into set, we should be able to run our offense, and cleanly, and it should work perfectly,” Klotzer said as he elaborated on the team’s offense.
He added, “As long as we play our game and do what we’re supposed to do and what we practice, we should win no problem.”
The men’s team is 13-10 away win against Mt. San Antonio College last Wednesday has given the team two consecutive wins, and after Wednesday, the team seeks to make it three.
“We need to go into this game focused and play our own game and not worry about the other team,” freshman 2-meter offensive player Michael Hanna said. “As long as we do that we’ll come out on top.”
Freshman driver Matthew Skinas added, “If we play our game and do what we typically do, we’ll definitely win.”
Sophomore attacker Teresa Zuniga, along with the rest of the women’s team, seeks to improve the overall record and spark some momentum heading into the first home game of the season.
“We’ll come out strong and confident, but at the end of the day all that matters is the final score.”
Tuning added, “It’s our first home game of the season, so I’m excited. Hopefully we can pick up a win.”
The women’s game is at 3 p.m. while the men’s game is at 4:15 p.m.
