Water polo handed two consecutive home losses

After back-to-back losses at home two weekends ago, the Blue Jays sought to avenge their previous performance with matches against the George Washington University Colonials and the Wagner College Seahawks.

Unfortunately for the Jays, the weekend did not have a happy ending — once again.

To start, the Jays took on the Colonials Friday night in the Newton White Aquatic Center.

Less than four minutes into the match, the Colonials jumped out to a four goal lead before junior utility Josh Kurtz scored the Jays’ first goal at the 3:56 mark.

The Colonials quickly responded with back-to-back goals, ending the first quarter with a sizable five-goal lead over the Jays.

The Blue Jays and the Colonials traded goals back and forth in the second quarter, as the Jays failed to make any advances on their five-goal deficit, trailing the Colonials 5-10 going into the half.

A five-goal run in the fourth quarter pushed the Colonials to a 17-8 lead. The Jays’ freshman driver Stephen Schmidt ended the Colonials’ run with a goal at the 5:09 mark, only to see the Colonials come back with a pair of goals.

Hopkins would fall to George Washington for the third time in their last four meetings in a final score of 20-10.

However, some good news did come out of the loss. Senior John Wilson, who finished the day with 12 saves and three steals in the loss, became the program’s all-time leader in saves with 664 career stops following the match against the Colonials.

He passed two-time All-American Jeremy Selbst, who finished his Hopkins career in 2010 with 662 career saves.

“I felt proud to reach the record,” Wilson said. “But mostly I was grateful for all of the support that I have had from my coaches, and especially my parents, along the way.”

Wilson and Selbst are now the only two goalies in program history with more than 600 saves. Not to mention, Wilson still has more than half of his final water polo season left to continue to build on his program’s record.

The Blue Jays were back in the pool Saturday evening for their matchup with the Wagner Seahawks. Once again, the Jays allowed their opponents to sprint to an early lead, as the Seahawks went up 5-0 in the opening five minutes of play.

Finally, junior attacker Ryan Masi got on the board for Hopkins with 1:49 to play in the first quarter.

Kurtz followed up with another goal for the Blue Jays 51 seconds later to put it at a 5-2 game by the end of the first quarter.

The Seahawks opened the second quarter with a four goal run, pushing their lead to 9-2 over the Jays. Wagner continued to build on their lead, going up 12-4 by halftime.

After another unanswered run by the Seahawks, the Jays fell to an irreversible deficit.

Though Kurtz, who led the Jays’ offense with a hat trick in the match, was able to spark some magic for Hopkins late in the fourth quarter, the 5-1 scoring run was not enough for the Jays, as they fell to the Seahawks 12-20.

This means that the Jays have yet to win a home game or a Mid-Atlantic Water Polo Conference (MAWPC) game this season. They will have just one more chance at a home win this season on Oct. 21 against the Navy Midshipmen.

The Blue Jays traveled to Annapolis, Md. to cap off the weekend with another disappointing loss on Sunday against the Midshipmen.

This game looked a lot like the others, as the Blue Jays went scoreless in the first half of play.

The Midshipmen took the early lead in the first half and continued to shut out the Jays 6-0 until Schmidt got the Jays on the board with a man-up goal at 6:40 in the third quarter.

The match remained pretty much hopeless for the Blue Jays, who were down 10-1 after a three-goal run by the Midshipmen to start the final quarter.

However, junior attacker Andreas Katsis had an impressive run of his own in the final minutes of the match, scoring three goals in the span of just two minutes.

Still, the Jays would fall to the Midshipmen 10-4, losing two of the last three matchups against them. The Jays are now 7-51 all-time against Navy.

The losses push Hopkins to 0-5 in Conference play this year. They are 8-2 in games outside of their Conference this year, however, so there is a lot of hope going into their upcoming tournament.

Though they went 0-3 over the week, the Jays played some tough competition, so their ranking should not be hurt too much by the losses.

The Jays remain ranked in the top 10 nationally among Division-III teams, though they fell from fifth to seventh with the blowout losses.

Next weekend, the Blue Jays gear up for their big annual trip to California — which much of the Hopkins team calls home — for the Gary Troyer Invitational in Claremont, Calif. on October 6 and 7.

“Playing in California is always a good halfway mark in the season,” Wilson said. “It allows us to catch up with family and revitalize for the second half of the season.”

Luckily, the Jays have a couple of days to recover before they leave for California this Thursday. Wilson explained that they will strive to readjust their game before entering the tournament.

“West coast water polo teams generally run their offense through the center position, so we are looking to coordinate a drop to help defend the center, as opposed to our usual press defense,” Wilson said.

The Blue Jays are set to open the tournament on Friday with a doubleheader against the University of Redlands Bulldogs and then against the host team, the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps (Claremont McKenna College, Harvey Mudd College and Scripps College) Stags.

With their success this season against non-Conference teams, look for a strong performance from the team.