Category: General

Hello from the women’s team! Winter is coming…and so is our competition season. This term, we’ve had the opportunity to practice three times a week with coaching and support from Jim Wilson and Meg Hedrick. We’ve welcomed enthusiastic new players into our tightly-knit WaPo family and we’re strengthening our teamwork in and outside of the pool, whether that’s in class or at our post-practice dinners.

We’re also gearing up for our winter term tournaments. This term, the team will be playing at Boston University from February 18th-19th and then at Williams College from February 25th-26th. And in even more news — we’re bringing back our spring break training trip! We’ll be in Santa Barbara from March 19th to the 24th. (If you’ll be in town, let us know!)

Winter at Dartmouth is both beautiful and very isolating. Having a team to rely on for healthy competition, wellness, and support is so meaningful to all of us. Thank you for reading & supporting our squad!

Fall has sprung here in Hanover, NH. The leaves are starting the change, the rain is becoming more frequent, and the temperature has been dropping. Despite this, campus life, and water polo, are in full swing. The campus is at full capacity and practices for our team have resumed. There are a staggering ten new players and we have been hard at work to welcome these individuals into our water polo community. We are currently practicing twice a week to develop new players and a strong team bond before their season begins in the winter. Additionally, we are connecting outside the pool through joint social events with the men’s team, hikes, and dinners.

It’s been so great to be back in the pool after a long covid-induced break! Returning as a junior has also given me a great opportunity to meet underclassmen & take on a leadership role in the pool. I am so grateful to be a part of a club with so many strong, dedicated women!!

- Abbi Fralick '23

We are sad to see our wonderful seniors graduate and leave us, but we are excited to see them flourish. Thanks to Sunny Tang, Judy Li, Maggie Flaherty, Emily Zurcher, and Jada Brown for having such amazing spirits and keeping us together, especially during this pandemic. 4 long years on the Dartmouth Women's Water Polo team and now you're off to the world!

And, as one year ends another begins. Here's a special shoutout to those stepping up as our new 21-22 officers and players:

While we have only been able to practice in person once, we have kept up a strong community and friendship over Zoom! Here is a peak of what it's been like during the 20-21 school year:

We've done a mix of just checking in and talking, playing water polo themed trivia (our coach Jim even came for this one!) and begun a discussion series focused around Racial (In)Justice. Regardless of distance, we always find a way to support each other as teammates and friends!

The first few weeks of practice have been awesome! We are so glad to see many new members joining us in the pool as we get back in shape for this year.

Check out some photos of the team having fun in the locker room and at a team dinner!

Another great season on the books!

Congrats to senior Emily Robertson (#7) and freshman Emily Zurcher (#6) on being selected to the New England All Conference Second Team! Even though we're already missing our amazing seniors, we're looking forward to next year.

Thank you Katherine Flessel, Adina Harri, Jessie Jones, and Emily Robertson for all of your heart, time, and friendship the last four years!!

 

The Dartmouth women had an exciting tournament this past weekend at Williams College, defeating Williams 17-3, BU 9-8 in the quarterfinals, and Wesleyan 14-8 in the finals to take the New England division championship title and earn a bid to Nationals in Pittsburgh (May 4-7)! We are so proud of how far our (small but mighty) team has come this year, and we are looking forward to matchups against teams from all over the country in a few weeks at Nationals.

This upcoming weekend is an exciting time for the Dartmouth Women's Water Polo Team, because we will be hosting our first-ever home tournament!

The tournament will take place both this Saturday, April 11 and Sunday, April 12 at the Upper Valley Aquatics Center (UVAC) in White River Junction, VT (about a 10 minute drive from campus) and will include all the teams in our league. We would love as many familiar faces, family, and fans as possible to be there to cheer us on! This is our final tournament before New England Champs and we are so excited to have the opportunity to host all of our peers this weekend.

Dartmouth will be playing 4 games in total over the course of the weekend:

Saturday at 9:00 AM vs. US Coast Guard Academy
Saturday at 2:50 PM vs. Williams College

Sunday at 12:30 PM vs. University of Massachusetts
Sunday at 4:00 PM vs. Wesleyan University

Feel free to join us at as many or as few of these matches as you can, and we hope to see you there!

Fresh off of a great experience at Princeton last weekend, the team once again packed up the caps and balls, this time heading to Middlebury for the first New England Conference Tournament of the 2015 season. We arrived on Friday night, getting some extra time for team bonding - we all shared a few laughs watching "50 Shade of Grey" at the local movie theater, followed by an awesome team dinner where we had a few more laughs. After, we headed to sleep early, knowing we had a big day ahead of us.

Saturday morning we had a big breakfast at our hotel before driving to the beautiful Middlebury Natatorium, where the tournament was already underway. Our first game was against the home team, the Middlebury Panthers. Although the Panthers got out to a quick lead, the Big Green managed to put away a couple of goals, making the final score 7-3, Middlebury. After a delicious lunch from Noonie's Deli (a DWWP classic), the Big Green faced off against the squad from Boston College. Both the Dartmouth offense and defense were much more coordinated and generally looked a lot better in this game; the Big Green beat the Boston Eagles 6-2. Although exhausted, the Dartmouth women only allowed 3 goals from Northeastern in their final game of the day, a true testament to the Big Green defense and goal tending prowess by Shelley Wenzel '14 (#1). Happy with the final score of 13-3, the Dartmouth women made it back to the hotel, ready to get some rest before their final game on Sunday.

With only a single game on Sunday, the Big Green was motivated to play their best against University of Massachusetts. Although off to a slow start in the first quarter, the Big Green ended up with a very productive offense later in the game, with goals flying into the cage left and right, including from Adina Harri '18 (#5) - her first ever water polo goal - and several from Carolina Ardila-Zurek T'16 (#10). Although tired, the team was happy with the 11-1 final score and even happier to be headed back to Hanover! We are so excited to have started the season off so well, and even more excited to play the next New England Conference Tournament at our own Upper Valley Aquatic Center Pool in White River Junction, VT the weekend of April 11th.

For the CWPA schedule and scores, please visit this site.

This weekend, the Dartmouth Women's Club Water Polo Team traveled down to Princeton, NJ to compete in the first annual Ivy League Water Polo Tournament. While it was a long drive down to New Jersey, Fanis kept one car entertained by alternating classic American and Greek music. After arriving safely and soundly, the team crashed, wanting to rest up for the start of the season the next day.

 

The team was in high spirits as we approached the beautiful DeNunzio Pool Saturday morning, ready to play well and climb the club team tournament bracket. In our first game of the day, the Big Green faced off against the Columbia Lions. With some great offense and amazing defense, Dartmouth got out ahead quickly with two goals from captain Cat Donahoe '15 (#10) in the first quarter. Two more Dartmouth goals came from Katie Lachance '15 (#3) and freshman Emily Robertson '18 (#17) before Columbia snuck a shot past Big Green goalie Shelley Wenzel '14 (#1). Other than a few lucky shots, Wenzel was an amazing goalie throughout the game; even after she took a shot to the nose, Donahoe was only in the cage for a few minutes before Wenzel was back. Offensively, Big Green goals continued to hit the back of the Lion's net, with additional goals coming from Caitlin Flint '16 (#6) - her first! - Margaret Rollins '15 (#2), and Meghan Christie '17 (#8). Overall, it was a great opening game for DWWP with a final score of 11-3.

The Big Green faced the Cornell Big Red next, again getting out to a quick lead and holding it there with fantastic defense; at the end of the first quarter, the score was 2-1 and by the end of the game it was 6-3. Although the team was tired, we were excited by how well we'd played for the first day of the first tournament of the season (and the first game of water polo ever for some, including freshman Adina Harri '18 (#5)!). After a wonderful dinner - thanks to the Rollins family! - we went back to the hotel to crash and prepare for facing varsity teams the next day.

Having won the club bracket, Dartmouth Women's Water Polo faced off against Division I Varsity teams on Sunday: first the host team Princeton, and then Harvard. While outmatched, the Big Green showed a lot of effort and character throughout the games; Dartmouth lost to Princeton 12-1 and Harvard 14-0. Still, happy and proud of their performance, the team headed back to Hanover to prepare for the upcoming weekend, the first conference tournament of the year. We hope to see some family and friends at Middlebury and thank you so much to our fans - the Rollins and alumna Grace McDevitt '14 included - who came out to support us this weekend!