November 17, 2005

Dangerous waters

Is high school water polo becoming too violent?

By Kymberli W. Brady
Staff Writer 

Concerns raised over increasingly aggressive behavior and serious injuries in high school water polo has officials concerned about the future of the sport.

The culture of water polo is extremely physical and in some cases, has gone beyond the norm, prompting officials at the CCS level to take measures to make the sport safer. Photo by Kymberli Brady

According to Blossom Valley Athletic League Director Barbara Beard, the problem will be discussed at a meeting between coaches and a CCS task force of administrators on Nov. 16. All of the information gathered at that meeting will be taken to the CCS and the Board of Managers meeting in January.

Beard said all decisions regarding changes to the water polo bylaws will be announced by then.

Historically, water polo, also known as the “blood sport” was so violent, resuscitation was commonplace and women weren’t allowed to participate until nearly a century later. (See sidebar on page 40.) By then, it had become much more civilized through regulations, but has recently started reverting backwards. Reports of brutality at high school water polo games, between boys as well as girls, are sounding alarms with school principals and league officials, who are scrambling to gain a stronghold on the problem.

Severe injuries on the rise
As the violence increases, the severity of the injuries intensifies. Scratches are deeper, scars left from brutal bite marks are becoming more common and broken bones more serious. The most recent incidents involved Almaden-area high school students who suffered deep cuts, bites, and in one case a broken nose so severe that surgery was required to repair the break, prompting the attending emergency room physician to report the matter to the police.

According to Pioneer High School Athletic Director Mark Krail, the culture of water polo is extremely physical and in some cases, has gone beyond the norm, prompting officials at the CCS level to take measures to make the sport safer.

“Obviously we have an issue here,” he said. “Water polo is in a crisis state right now with its brutal nature. The problem is that so much of what happens, happens under the water.”

As current president of the Peninsula Referees Association [PRA], Rick Curry has been involved in the sport at every level. The former player and coach, who has spent the past 15 years as an official, now runs the assigning body for the water polo association, which services the entire Bay area, including PAL, BVAL, Santa Clara Valley, and West Catholic Leagues.

“There’s no doubt that we’ve seen increased brutality over the last two or three seasons—especially since the last Olympics,” said Curry. “It’s definitely become an issue as far as physical play goes.”

An estimated 10 serious injuries have already been reported this season—two more than last season—which Curry said may not be much in the way of numbers, but when it comes to brutality in school sports, even one is one too many.

“The fact that there are brutalities in the game at all definitely makes it a problem,” he said. “And it’s not just up here. Down in southern California, I know they’re having major problems over these sorts of issues.”

The trail of violence, and in some cases bloodshed, can be found throughout the state, leaving in its wake a faction of players worried for their safety and coaches concerned about the future of the sport.

“They should be concerned,” said Beard. “Yes, there have been altercations, not only in the BVAL, but throughout the entire CCS section. This has been discussed at the CCS Board of Managers, and we are concerned about the brutality that has been occurring in water polo. We are all addressing it in order to keep the sport. Right now, all we can do is follow the bylaws.”

Although she feels strongly that the kids are old enough to know better and should be treated as such, Hannah Lineberry, a junior at California State University of Monterey Bay and Carmel High School girls’ water polo coach, said the responsibility ultimately lies with the coaches, but should also be shared with the referees—or the lack thereof—especially in a sport that today needs more watchful eyes to prevent it from digressing back to its older, less gentler ways.

“We’re stretched out here,” agrees Curry. “There are not enough coaches or officials to properly manage the game. This is a tough thing to recruit for—it’s tough getting good officials for any sport.”

Lineberry’s pursuit of a degree in athletics includes work on a paper that sheds new light on one possible scenario that might explain how water polo has turned more violent in recent years.

“I’m finding in my research that water polo was very violent when it started,” she said. “The rules had to change entirely for it to be a playable sport. The problem today stems from the late 1990s into 2000 and at the Olympics, where the better teams were the ones that were more aggressive. Now the players from those teams are becoming coaches and they’re teaching more of that aggression. I’m also finding that older coaches in their 40s and higher are teaching players good defense, while the younger ones are teaching the underwater kicking and pulling on suits.”

According to former Olympian and Leland High School boys’ water polo Coach Mike Monsees, every coach has his or her own style of teaching the game, but he remains concerned with those who he said aren’t capable of teaching the basic techniques well enough to allow their teams to win without resorting to violence.

“We do have a number of coaches who played against aggressive teams and so instead of focusing on the basics, they focus on ways to be aggressive in order to score points. They need to work instead on the basics of the game.”

Player sent to hospital
While attending a game between Pioneer and Santa Teresa High Schools three weeks ago to support her younger brother, Lineberry witnessed an attack that sent one of his teammates to the hospital with a broken nose that later required surgery.

“I was watching closely because my brother was playing,” she said. “One player started punching his teammate, who came out of the pool covered in blood. The fact that stuff like this is happening at all tells me we need more qualified referees in water polo. But as a coach, if I see that kind of aggression in one of my girls, I’d take her out because she obviously needs a break. Whether I put her back in or not would depend on whether I felt she was ready.”

In some cases, disturbing displays of aggression have nothing to do with what goes on under the water’s surface and everything to do with emotions that rise to the surface as a result of the game, as demonstrated when a coach for Piedmont Hills High School threw a chair against a wall and threw another chair into the pool during a recent game against Willow Glen High School.

“That kind of behavior is not tolerated,” said Beard. “The principal acted appropriately and the coach was removed from his position. He has been replaced. And so has another coach on that team.”

Jay Noble, whose son also plays for Pioneer feels that given the circumstances surrounding the recent matches call for placing tighter restrictions and penalties on the coaches and would send a “clear message” to the water polo community that unnecessary violence will no longer be tolerated—whether the referees see it or not.

“It’s very hard to see specific actions,” he said. “But when a player is bleeding from three or four 8- to 12-inch scratches on his chest and back, my first reaction is what was he playing against, a puma? Then I noticed another kid with bite marks on his forearm—it was a full set of teeth, tops and bottoms. It was Mike Tyson-esque and those marks were there for a week or two afterwards. Then another kid comes out of the pool covered in blood.
You have to work really hard to dig into somebody like that and I don’t know how they got away with it. The all border on pre-meditation and are unacceptable. If I were the coach, I’d seriously consider pulling those kids off the team.”

“I thought it was absolutely horrifying,” adds Jay’s wife Dena. “That kid didn’t do anything to provoke it, yet he was attacked repeatedly. Of the many games I’ve been to, I’ve never seen anything like it. The referees need to be more concerned about this and not look the other way.”

Little tolerance on the horizon
The BVAL executive board met last month to discuss changing the bylaws in an effort to put tighter screws on the heated issue before it reaches a boiling point.

“We are making every effort to act in a proactive design,” Beard said. “We are looking at using the same bylaws currently in place with soccer.”

Current discussions could include changes that will adopt the same bylaws for ejection that are currently in place in the sport of soccer, which went through a similar period of violence a few years back.

Under the current bylaws in soccer, one ejection forces the player to the bench for one game. Two ejections will put a player on the sidelines for three games and a player with three ejections is out for the rest of the season. Beard said the current bylaws have been effective in restoring the sport, and with stronger penalties that raise the stakes; coaches and players might be more inclined to follow the rules.

“I feel pretty strongly that you are going to see that come into the water polo bylaws,” she said. “Right now we’re dealing with coaches and players. I have a feeling that we’re going to see a change and a strengthening when misconduct will bring more than a one game ejection.”

Another possible ruling would require school personnel to be present at every game, one that is currently implemented at football games and at the BVAL’s Mt. Hamilton Division boys’ soccer games.

“The rest is based on the needs of the school, such as a game between rival teams,” Beard said. “But if it gets to where we need to have police at sporting events, then we don’t need sports.”

Sanctions and education
There’s little question as to what the main topic of discussion will be at the next BVAL coach’s meeting on Nov. 16. But Beard added that there will need to be a lot more education and dedication on the part of the coaches, starting with increased emphasis on compliance and a firm showing that such behavior—whether the game official sees it or not —will not be allowed.

“What I hear in any sport is the coach saying ‘well, there wasn’t a whistle. The official didn’t call it.’ And their response should be ‘I don’t care,’” said Beard. “If I’m at a game and I see one of my players throw an elbow and the official doesn’t see it, you can rest assured that player will be sitting next to me immediately. It is the coach who controls and educates their student athletes as to what direction this program is going. If they want to save this sport, they’re going to have to change what they’re doing.”

“Most of the contact is incidental,” Monsees added. “You’re engaged in physical contact in a zero-gravity environment. You’ve got hyper kids in an active situation and you have to teach them how to work together as a team and not as a responder to some sort of aggression. There are some people who haven’t played enough to figure it out. A lot of it is just inexperience.”

As important as sanctions would be in controlling added aggression, Curry stressed the importance of additional coach education.

“There are a few coaches in several different leagues this year that I’m not even sure are 21,” he said. “I don’t know what they went through to be able to start coaching or whether they were even mentored by anyone. The fact is the players need to play within the spirit of the rules and the coaches need to coach within that spirit.”

In the meantime, the US Water Polo team has already taken a major step in generating better trained, better informed leadership by requiring that all coaches for the first time in history be certified in order to participate in the 2006 Olympics.

Curry added that one parent with a son at UCLA is currently working on installing underwater cameras on a trial basis in an effort to monitor underwater grabbing.

“That may make a difference in some of the ways the game is played,” said Curry. “I definitely think the hammer needs to come down and some things need to change, because it would be a shame if it got too brutal for its own good. It’s an awesome sport.”