After a dominating 2006 season that saw the Boys Varsity Water Polo team win 14 of its 17 games and finish second in the New England Championships, the 2007 team was plagued by inexperience. After a year of rebuilding, this year’s water polo team appears to have the talent and game experience to regain success for the Andover program. The graduation of the 2006 seniors enabled the 2007 varsity players to occupy key positions on the team. Last year, the team focused on developing and giving underclassmen playing time and experience. The 2007 team started off slowly, hitting a tough stretch, but showed bright spots, talent and team unity, winning three in a row near the end of the season. Eventually, the team finished with five wins in 15 games. Now, a young, growing team looks to steadily improve on its 2007 season and to make large strides in the upcoming season. Led by Captain William Faulkner ’09, the team welcomes back 18 of the 22 varsity members. With seven members of the 2009 graduating class, five from the 2010 class, and six from the 2011 class all returning, this year’s team has tremendous depth. The team already has a stalwart defense including Parker Washburn ’09, Brendan Deveney ’09 and Larry Zhou ’09 and a steady goalie in Captain Faulkner. The new players look to complement the young, developing players on the offense such as Curtis Hon ’10 and Matthew Mahoney ’11. Although the 2007 season was a particularly difficult and frustrating one for the team, the players believe this season will bring success and many wins. Hon ’10, one of the keys to the team’s potential success this year, said, “Our team already seems to be better than last year at this point in the season, and we look to improve even further.” Andover looks to duplicate the flash of talent and success they showed last year, when the team won three straight games near the end of the season. With new maturity and increased skills in each player, Andover hopes to make it back to the New England Championships. The team opens its season on Saturday with games against NMH and Deerfield.
