CWU’s water polo club looks forward to hosting their upcoming fall tournament on Nov. 18. The tournament is scheduled as a one day event, but could potentially stretch to two days if more than seven teams register.

Team members like club Vice President Curtis Condotta have their eyes set on one main purpose for this tournament: raising money for the club.

“It’s not super competitive, obviously I’m a competitive person, but nothing really happens if you win,” Condotta said.

Condotta and the team hope that the money raised from the  tournament can be put towards the club in a variety of ways, including helping to pay for new team equipment.

Although the main priority surrounding this tournament is to raise money, Club President Mollie Ridge still has expectations and hopes for her team heading into this tournament.

“I think just getting some of the players on this team a lot more experience than they’ve actually had so far because our team carries a lot of [different skill] levels,” Ridge said.

With the purpose behind this tournament being not to necessarily win, practices have become more focused on teaching newer players the game.

We’re working on “team building and the basic skills for water polo,” said team member Jonah Kathlean.

The team’s preparations for the tournament have been motivated by the fact that the team is having to adjust to the amount of new people  on the team this year.

“We have a lot of newcomers this year so we’re basically just teaching the sport,” Kathlean said.

Even though this may seem like a setback for the team in terms of skill level, the most important aspect is that the club continues to grow.

“In general, I think that the biggest thing is to just grow the program because I think that water polo is a great sport, but it’s not as popular as other sports like soccer,” Condotta said. “For me, I’d just like to try and get the word out about this sport and have as many people experience water polo as possible.”

With that being said, the relevance of this growth has been evident on this year’s team.

“We’ve had a lot of people join the team this year,” Condotta said. “Last year we probably had six to seven people per practice, and this year we’ve been averaging around 10 to 15 people per practice.”

Moving forward, players like Ridge hope to have a positive impact on their team.

“I just hope to get the newcomers on this team more experience so that they can see what the game truly is,” Ridge said. “I have two players on this team that have never played in their entire lives, who have just joined in college, whereas the rest of the team has played for two or three plus years.”

Along with the various preparations and expectations that go into these types of tournaments, it’s also important to remember that being able to develop the right mindset can sometimes be all that matters.

“We’re just trying to have fun,” said club member Kathlean. “Since we’re a club, we’re not terribly serious about winning. We just want to mainly have fun and go out there and play the game of polo.”