Once penniless Syracuse water polo club to host first intercollegiate tournament
IF YOU GO:
What: New York Division Women’s Club Water Polo
When: Saturday at 12:15 p.m. and Sunday at 9:30 a.m.
Where: Saturday at Webster Pool and Sunday at Sibley Pool (Women’s Building)
How Much: Free
Lisa Carolla, president of the women’s club water polo team at Syracuse University, knows how to attract a crowd.
‘It’s basically girls in swimsuits wrestling in water,’ she said.
But two months ago, drawing attention wasn’t the problem for the club. It was raising enough funds to support a team. In the fall they had no goals, no coach and no money – a tournament was not even in the realm of possibility.
The Syracuse Women’s Club Water Polo team will be holding its first-ever tournament at SU this weekend. Syracuse will host women’s teams from the New York division, including New York University, Cornell University, Columbia University and Colgate University. The four-game series will take place Saturday at Webster Pool in Archbold Gymnasium and Sunday at Sibley Pool in the Women’s Building.
Both the women’s and men’s teams were practicing and playing with make-shift goals constructed by men’s water polo coach Art Lilienthal. The goals, made of PVC piping and duct tape, kept crashing down on the players whenever they spiked the ball into them.
Carolla knew if they wanted to be taken seriously, something needed to change. The first step was finding a permanent coach.
Carl Murray, a junior on the SU Men’s Club Water Polo team, agreed to take over as the women’s coach after their previous coach of three years, Zach Shufran, left for graduate school.
‘We always practice with the women’s team so they asked me to be their coach,’ Murray said. ‘I met with them, we discussed it. I played in high school and had that experience so it was a good fit.’
Over winter break, Carolla received an e-mail from the Collegiate Water Polo Association (CWPA) saying the school hosting the first tournament of the women’s season had backed out, and there was no host. Carolla waited a while before e-mailing the CWPA describing the situation of the SU club team, but their willingness to host. The CWPA agreed, and Carolla knew she had her hands full.
‘We got back from winter break, and I told girls we were hosting a tournament,’ Carolla said. ‘I told them we needed to make $2,000 in less than a month. We need to make this happen.’
The team started what Carolla has called the great fundraising escapade to purchase official goals for the tournament. The players sent letters and e-mails to family and friends asking for donations. The effort paid off when the new goals arrived this past week, just in time for the tournament.
‘We’ve really come leaps and bounds,’ Murray said. ‘It’s really great to go from practicing with these PVC goals for two years, and now we’re going to practice once with these new goals then host a tournament, so we’re going from one extreme to the other, and it’s extremely exciting.’
Carolla praised her teammates and all those who made the event a possibility.
‘We’re winging it,’ Carolla said. ‘We don’t have a way to keep score, we don’t have a shot clock, but just in the last two weeks we’ve found a way to make this happen.’
