Love the concept, but I think most parents guiding their children choose water polo as a backdoor into college, not for the “benefits of the sport”.
I think most kids would be better served by more main stream sports if college is the true goal. Football, baseball, and basketball scholarships are way more prevalent 85 to 105 rides per team as opposed to 4.5 rides for wapo.
My point being that it is entry into college, not necessarily scholarships.
1 Like
Commerce is funded by the Casino, I believe.
That’s foolish. Youth sports don’t exist solely as backdoors. Those spots are very limited and if that’s your goal, you will likely be sorely disappointed. People stay with water polo (and other sports) for the benefit of getting enjoyment from the game.
2 Likes
USA Water Polo does a huge disservice with an ad campaign that shows “Water Polo Tough” (as in difficult). When you are basically telling people how hard it is, no wonder the numbers are down.
1 Like
Agree. There are are about 3,000-4,000 seniors in California(of each gender) who play hs water polo, plus quite a few kids in Texas, Chicago, East Coast, Hawaii, etc. Say 100 (ballpark number) continue in college. To state that most families consider hs water polo as a back door to college is probably not very accurate.
1 Like
The only other city capable of doing what Commerce does is the City of Industry, and for decades they did. The aquatics center they built produced some of the greatest American swimmers ever. Inexplicably they dropped the program and demolished the amazing center.
No city, not Irvine, not Beverly Hills, not Lafayette has the discretionary money that Commerce does.
Irvine has a population 25x that of Commerce.
2 Likes