A splashing debut

The 1980s have been the decade for Harvard to adopt traditionally Californian sports. First men's and women's volleyball became varsity competitors, then men's water polo. This year, women's varsity water polo finally made the trip East.

Radcliffe water polo actually has a long and prosperous history, but team members' efforts to have the sport elevated to varsity status initially found few sympathizers in the Athletic Department. The men's team gained level-two varsity status in 1980 and last December, after several years of lobbying, the women's team followed suit.

The squad had always had a strong core of devoted players at its thrice-weekly practices, but seldom were there enough team members on hand for full-pool, seven-on-seven scrimmages. That meant that when the club played games, it would see full-strength competition for the first time.

With its four years of club-level experience behind it, though, the squad set out to prove it deserved its newly earned varsity status. "Showing we could be established as a varsity team was an important as how well we played," says one of the squad's graduating tri-captains, Martha Wood.

Varsity status brought pool time and a part-time coach, Harvard water polo guru Steve Pike, the first and only coach of the men's team. And the squad's attitude began to change. All the players showed up, five times a week, for practices, and there were always enough on hand to allow for scrimmages.

Pike, who had helped the squad out informally as he coached the men's spring club team in past years, gave the aquawomen some of the basic in struction they needed. Almost all of the player, who are current or ex-swimmers trying the sport out for the first time in college--made the switch from competitive swimming.

Serious

With the more serious atmosphere fostered by Pike and by the team's three co-captains, Wood, Sarah Spence and Sally Glimp, the squad began to take itself a lot more seriously.

That attitude showed up in games, where the aquawomen, who were fairly successful as a club, found that they could at least stay with, if not defeat, the best teams in the East. In earning a 12-6-1 record, the squad played competitively with powerhouses Brown and Princeton, and topped last year's East Coast champions, Queens.

"We showed we could play with almost anyone," Wood says, citing a tie with Brown and a last-minute loss to Slippery Rock, the nation's second-ranked team.

"Now," Wood says, "we just want to keep on going year after year."