The exciting, though a bit confusing sport of water polo

If I had a quarter for every time someone asked me when I was going to write about the sport of water polo, I'd have… well, exactly no quarters! Seriously, no one has ever mentioned water polo to me and to be truthful, I have never given thought to a column on this sport.So why now, you ask? The thought came to me as I was browsing through the guide channels on TV the other day. Two consecutive channels were showing the NCAA Men's Water Polo Championship and the NCAA Women's Water Polo Championship. So naturally I tuned in, became enamored by the action, and decided I had to write about the experience. Right?Again, no would be the answer. I did not choose to view the action, but something about the information caught my attention. It seems the two schools involved in the men's title match were UCLA and Cal. For the ladies it was the same two schools. That piqued my interest. So it was off to the internet to get more info on what schools actually offered the sport. What I found was worth the write… at least in my opinion.We'll start with the men's game. I asked how many colleges or universities had water polo teams and what I found shocked me. The response was that approximately 75 schools had men's water polo teams. Approximately???The question seemed innocent enough. Either a school has a team or it doesn't, or so I thought. Exactly why the word approximately was used is a mystery to me. Perhaps a college offers the sport every other year! When I started looking over the list of universities that had water polo teams another thought popped into my head.Maybe some of the teams were just club sports and not officially sponsored. Would it matter if the school was in a different division? I did not get a satisfying explanation so we are going to go with "approximately" 75 schools offering men's water polo programs. No real problem here as another site suggested that there is 90 men's water polo teams!What I also found while scouring the list of participating schools was the fact that 43 of those nearly 75 colleges were in the same state. Any ideas which one? If you guessed California, you would be correct. Many of the schools offering the sport are not necessarily household names. Let's look at a few.American River College (Sacramento) has a team as does Westcliff University (Irvine). Other obscure colleges (at least to me) in California that embrace the sport of water polo include: Biola University (La Mirada), Chaffey College (Rancho Cucamonga), Saddleback College (Mission Viejo) and Citrus College (Glendora).Another college that got my attention was from the President's Conference in Pennsylvania, Washington and Jefferson (I've heard of both those gentlemen) College. For my senior year in college, Hiram switched to the President's Conference. I played both basketball and baseball against W&J. No water polo though, as Hiram did not play the sport.Though there may be a few colleges in Ohio that have water polo teams, there was one nearby city that had three different schools with men's water polo teams. That would be the city of Erie, Pennsylvania. The three schools are Gannon College, Mercyhurst University and Penn State, Erie – Behrend.Let's try one more. McKendree University in Lebanon, Illinois has a men's water polo team though the university is more famous for their bowling teams. Seriously!As for the distaff side of the sport. There are 36 women's teams that offer water polo programs. "Approximately" half (17) of those schools are once again found in California. Though I could not find any existing schools in the Big Ten that offered NCAA men's water polo, there were two that had women's teams. Michigan and Indiana offer women's water polo. That number will increase as UCLA and USC enter the Big Ten this fall.Other not so well known schools that offer the sport for women include Brown, Marist, Wagner, Bucknell and Virginia Military Institute.One final message that took me by surprise in the original article I found was the fact that water polo is considered one of the fastest growing sports in the United States. The fact that many colleges recruit players from foreign countries may not be necessary in the future.So if you have been reading along expecting to get some valuable information about the sport of water polo, I'm afraid you will be disappointed. I have no experience with the game. Part of the reason that I have never played water polo might be the fact that I can NOT tread water. Put me in the deep end of the pool and I will start swimming for the side. I would have no time to play a game before panicking!Actually though I must confess that I did play a version of water polo in my younger days. It went by a little different name then. What was it? Oh yeah, it was called Marco…Polo!