A notable regular season ended with an eighth-place finish for the Dartmouth men's club water polo team at the National Collegiate Club Championship this weekend at Ohio University in Athens, Ohio. This year's ranking was just one spot below the squad's best ever seventh-place finish in 2001.
Despite the fact that Dartmouth emerged from the national tournament with a 1-3 record, the Big Green successfully moved up five spots from its original ranking, No. 13, to finish the season ranked No. 8 nationally.
The team's lone win in Athens came in the form of a 5-4 first-round upset of No. 10 University of Colorado-Boulder.
After two lead changes, Dartmouth co-captain Doug Nelson '10 connected on a fourth-quarter goal with 4:10 remaining to clinch the game against the Buffaloes.
Instrumental in the win was Mike Bazylewicz DMS '08, who recorded a hat trick in the second period and earned player of the game honors. Nicholas Riolo Tu'09's tally in the first quarter, which tied the team up at 1-1, was also essential in a closely contested matchup. Goalie Kyle Finnegan '09 blocked seven shots to help the team to the win.
Despite the three losses in the tournament, Nelson praised the squad for its effort.
"I think we've been playing well," Nelson said. "We were definitely a little rusty, because we were three weeks out and nervous going into the first game, but we managed to pull it out."
The upset put Dartmouth against No. 1 California Polytechnic State University, the defending champion of the tournament.
The game was a struggle for Dartmouth, and even a three-goal run by the Big Green at the close of the game could not put a dent in Cal Poly's lead. The Big Green ultimately lost, 10-5, to the powerhouse. Riolo, Bazylewicz, co-captain Porter Diehl '09, Charles Friedland '10 and Scott Sorensen '10 each contributed a goal in the defeat.
In Dartmouth's third game, the team fell in an overtime heartbreaker, 7-5, to No. 6 Grand Valley State University of Michigan. While Riolo tied the game up with a goal with 1:03 left in regulation time, GVSU prevailed in the pair of three-minute overtime periods. Nelson and Sorensen also put up tallies in the loss.
"We were very evenly matched, it was a couple inches here or there," Nelson said. "It was really a tough loss. We played a hard game the entire way, so there's really nothing we can complain about."
The Big Green's tournament play ended in another close defeat, this time a 5-4 loss to No. 17 University of Illinois-Chicago. UIC put in a goal with only 55 seconds left in the fourth quarter to seal the win. Nelson led the team with the first two goals, followed by Diehl and Sorenson.
Dartmouth's final ranking, not its 1-3 tournament record, is an indication of the team's domination during the regular season. The team ended the season with a 14-1 record, with its only loss coming from Boston College. The Big Green avenged this early season defeat by beating BC for first place in the Eastern Conference Championship and an automatic spot in the national tournament.
"Boston College, who we beat in the championship game, has been a perennial problem for us," Nelson said. "We haven't beaten them for a couple years, but we pulled out a one-goal victory in our final game to put us into Nationals."
Nelson counted the team's win over the Eagles in the wake of the early season loss as a highlight of the season.
"The season couldn't have been more successful," Nelson said. "We start training together about three weeks later than every other team in our league. Going into the first tournament, we were a little rusty, so we lost one of our games in the first tournament. But we came back strong in our second regional, and we got really psyched up for championships."
