Water polo looks to enter nation's top 10

By Tom Schreier

No. 9 UC-San Diego swam rapidly down the pool, much like a pack of sharks in search of wounded prey, as they battled Santa Clara at the Sullivan Aquatic Center.

Mitch Klipa, a senior defender on Santa Clara's water polo team, dropped back in order to curb UCSD's rush.

Treading water two meters away from the net, Klipa's man sat wide open in scoring position.

Klipa hurried to close in on him, but was too late.

His man was immediately fed a cross-pass in front of the net and scored the first goal of the game.

"It's split-second decisions where you think you're guarding this guy and you don't have that communication, either non-verbal or verbal, with your teammates," said Klipa, obviously upset about his mental lapse.

The tally deflated the confidence and pulled the plug on the initial energy generated by No. 11 Santa Clara. The team came into the October 16 contest looking to join the top 10 water polo teams in the nation.

"We always talk about how going from defense to offense...determines how you are going to do on offense because you get that adrenaline and energy," Klipa continued.

"It just felt like we were stagnant in all points of the game."

UCSD held on to win the game 10-7.

"There's no doubt in my mind that we should beat them," said Klipa. "I don't think we played to our potential.

"They're one of those teams that they hustle all the time so if you don't hustle all of the team they're going to beat you."

The game of water polo is similar to basketball in the water.

A water polo offense is designed much like a basketball team trying to break a zone.

For Santa Clara, the offense is run by Hobbs and Klipa, who both use their size to dominate both sides of the pool.

Hobbs (6'2'', 220lbs) posts up in front of the net and, while he has possession of the ball, waits as the rest of his teammates swim around him, searching for open positions they can shoot from.

While his teammates have the ball, he gets as close to the net as possible in order to allow the wings to close in on the net and feed him when he has a good angle.

Klipa, a defensive specialist, who stands 6'6'' and weighs 245 pounds, focuses on shutting down the other team's forwards.

"If you think about it in terms of old school basketball, if the big guy is Shaq, then I'm Ben Wallace guarding him," said the Michigan native, Klipa.

"He's a Pistons fan," noted Hobbs, laughing at his longtime teammate.

"And (the Pistons) won a championship when that was happening," said Klipa, finishing Hobbs' sentence. "So I like to (explain) it in those terms."

"When we're on offense I'm either trying to get Steve the ball or, if they're too far back, then I'll take a shot," said junior James Case, a lanky (6'1'', 185lbs) utility player.

"Whenever I'm on defense I'm always looking to swim onto offense."

Both Klipa and Case, a Connecticut native, came from areas where water polo was not very widespread.

Like Hobbs, most water polo players come from California.

In fact, most of the teams in the top 20 are located in the Golden State.

"My school was the only public school in Connecticut that had a water polo team," said Case.

"I was playing a bunch of boarding schools and private schools."

Case's team would travel as far south as Texas and as far north as Montreal in order to find competition.

Klipa was introduced to water polo by his sister, who played on the women's team at his high school.

His school did not have a men's team, but using a bylaw that allowed him to play water polo at his rival school, he joined one of the few high school water polo programs offered by a public school in Michigan.

Next up for the team is a four-game tournament at the Sullivan Aquatic Center starting on Saturday, October 23.

They will be playing Cal Baptist, Bucknell, Brown and Air Force.

Stephen Hobbs, a senior who runs the Broncos' offense, emphasizes the importance of focusing on small details and being energized early in order to emerge as the best team in the tournament.

"I know...we've had that energy in the fourth or fifth game of the tournament," said Hobbs, referencing the team's tendency to lack energy in the first few games of a tournament.

"It wasn't necessarily that we were tired. It just was that our focus was not there."

All three players are all expected to make a major impact this weekend and are looking forward to having a big crowd at Sullivan.

"Ever since we were here as freshmen...it was the guys who lived with guys on our team (that) always get real rowdy at games," said Klipa, who recalls many times when some of his buddies ended up getting booted from their contests.

"It's funny when you see it out of the corner of your eye, but then its like, 'They're fired up, why am I not fired up?'

"We love it when people come out to the games and we play pretty well so it should be exciting."

Tournament begins Saturday, 9 a.m.

Contact Tom Schreier at (408) 551-1918 or tschreier@scu.edu