Utter domination. That’s what the St. Louis U. High varsity water polo team unleashed on MICDS on Wednesday night, winning with a resounding 19-2 beatdown, as well as Ladue last night, demolishing them with a final score of 14-3. With this incredible pair of wins, there is no doubt that SLUH is the absolute favorite for the state title. 

MICDS

From the moment that SLUH walked into the Steward Family Aquatic Center at MICDS, they knew that a win was imminent. Due to a fiery conclusion at the end of the playoff qualifying game between 16 and 17 seeds MICDS and Clayton, MICDS’s head coach Claudio Mermelstein was ejected for unsportsmanlike conduct towards the referee. Without their head coach, several of the MICDS players had chosen to opt out of the game against SLUH, and the Rams were subsequently down to nine total players, less than half of what the team normally had. A lack of players is a serious disadvantage for a water polo team, as without subs, the starters become exhausted incredibly quickly. Knowing this, there was little pressure on the Jr. Bills as they mixed the starting six field players up with the deep bench to create a 50-50 split of starters and bench. All of this was in hopes of getting every player on the team a goal on the season. From the first swimoff, every player in the pool brought a raucous intensity to their game, as SLUH capitalized on a lightning fast swimoff from senior Will Steuer, who was able to tip the ball to junior Ryan Dignam for the first goal of the game in a mere 35 seconds, putting the Jr. Bills up one.

”That first goal felt so good,” said Dignam. “Normally I don't get in until the last quarter of the game, so scoring the first goal of the game was just special.”

The mayhem continued as senior captain and recent Santa Clara commit Nick Zimmerman found the goal on a massively powerful shot a mere minute later, and was swiftly followed by a counterattack off of a botched handoff from MICDS resulting in junior Jakob Brinkman to making the score 3-0 in just a minute and a half. SLUH was “letting the young boys eat,” and kept up the goals by bench players, with juniors Eddie Wills and Luke Jones each pocketing their second and seventh goals of the season, respectively. The momentum continued with excellent goals from Jones, Zimmerman, and Steuer, and by the time that the buzzer sounded and the first period was over, the Jr. Bills had outscored the Rams 8-0.

By the time that the second quarter came, SLUH was no longer seizing every opportunity to counterattack, and instead worked on plays and set up opportunities for bench players to score more goals. The less aggressive play style led to less goals in the quarter, but the Jr. Bills played good defense and held the Rams to just four shots in the first half. 

“Luke Jones was just lockdown,” said junior Matthew Franz. “If he guarded them, no one on the other team would score. Guaranteed.” 

SLUH finished out the first half with a resounding 13-0 lead over MICDS, and the momentum was not going to stop there.

The second half of the game followed in similar fashion, where SLUH would stunt MICDS’ offense with key defense from Jones and senior Jack Brawer, get the ball back to junior goalie John Rea, and set up plays to both run the clock out and develop their offense. This worked well for the Jr. Bills, as they were able to net three more goals in the third. It was only in the final quarter that MICDS was able to somewhat recoup and avoid the shutout, as they nailed in two goals in the final six minutes against SLUH’s full bench, as almost all the starters were benched for the entirety of the second half in order to create scoring opportunities for all of the team. Although the team was not entirely successful in getting every player a goal, the Jr. Bills were certainly successful in securing the win, ending the game with a respectable 19-2 victory.

Ladue

Last night, SLUH put on a clinic against Ladue in the quarterfinals in one of their most impressive showings of the year. The Jr. Bills performed with poise and explosive aggression, keeping the pace of the game throughout all four quarters, which allowed them to take the game with a decisive 14-3 victory. 

In the first quarter, SLUH took a little bit of time after the swim-off to find their rhythm, but the first scoring opportunity came from none other than Zimmerman, as he found the back of Ladue’s net with a monstrous shot to put the Jr. Bills up one. The pace of play continued to crawl, as the next SLUH goal came only in the fourth minute, as Steuer was able to capitalize off of a mismatch from Ladue and net the second goal of the game. Another first quarter beast was senior Aiden Jones, who was able to score near back-to-back goals in one of his best games of the season. Another incredible performance was that of Nick Roberts who had 16 saves to only 3 goals allowed in the entire game, with an 84% save percentage.

 “This game made me really confident in my abilities going forward,” said Robert. “When we play defense like we did today, I don't think there’s a team in Missouri that can stop us.”  

The first quarter was electric from the seniors, who contributed six out of seven goals in the quarter. Coming into the second quarter, the hype was still high, and the bench players were beginning to be subbed in, although the starters were still the main goal producers with Zimmerman scoring two, Franz scoring one, and junior captain Grant Heidbrink scoring one respectively.

 Coming into the second half, the starters had been pulled and the bench was in full swing as the game turned from aggressive to calculated. The third quarter followed this method faithfully, as SLUH took advantage of clock-burning offense and smothering defense. Ladue simply could not break through effectively, only scoring twice in the third quarter. The fourth quarter was no different, as the Jr. Bills continued to play for time and close out the game. One of the prides of SLUH water polo is that even though they could outscore most of their opponents by enormous margins, they choose not to. Unfortunately in this game, a tragic lapse in this tradition happened as junior Eddie Wills chose to shoot the ball with 6 seconds left, ending the game with a final score of 14-3.

Looking Ahead

After this theme of utter domination within Missouri has been the name of the game, SLUH will now face Lindbergh next Monday at 5:45. To say the least, the Jr. Bills aren’t letting off the gas. 

“If we play confident and to the best of our abilities,” said Franz. “No game will be close the rest of the season.”