By Dustin Evans

The Walled Lake Cobras water polo team took on the sixth best team in the state, the Dexter Dreadnaughts, on October 23, but both the varsity and JV teams lost their games after hard-fought battles. Varsity played first and lost 13-8, and JV followed, losing 14-2.

“We got off to a really slow start and just couldn’t figure out what we were doing by the end of the game,” JV goalie, sophomore Nathan Evans, said,

Dexter scored seven goals in the first quarter, two in the second, three in the third, and two in the last. All were left unanswered by the Cobras up until the start of the fourth quarter when they scored their first goal of the game.

Evans saw the team’s struggle to get anything going as    “A combination of us not staying on our guys and them getting open and taking good shots whenever they thought they had one.”

Prior to taking on Dexter, the teams were victorious against the Lake Orion Dragons on September 24 at home. Varsity beat the Dragons 15-0 and JV also won, beating the Dragons 10-3.

Evans said practicing sprints helped to ensure their win over Lake Orion. “We did a lot of sprints in practice to make sure we can keep up with our guys and we also practiced moving the ball around on offense and talking to each other.”

The team now holds a record of eight wins and seven losses on the season after a third place finish at the annual East Lansing varsity water polo tournament the weekend of October 10.

At the tournament, the varsity team lost its first game on Friday October 9 to the Okemos Chiefs 17-7 but won their second game that Friday  against the East Lansing Trojans 11-7. The next day, the team came back and beat the Lake Orion Dragons, once again, 11-2. Later that day, they beat the Haslett Vikings 10-9 to take third place overall.

The Cobras have two regular season games left, one home and one away, along with a JV tournament before their district tournament the weekend of October 24. If the Cobras win their district game, they will be the first team in Walled Lake water polo history to advance to regionals.