Bear Polo Falls Just Short, Finishes Third At Interschols

After a season of hard work and dedication, boys’ water polo finished third place at Interschols, after an 11-8 win to Suffield and 5-8 loss to Deerfield. Though the results from Interschols mirrored those of Exeter’s regular season, the games were closer and more intense.

Exeter had lost to Deerfield by a wide margin, 5-15, during their regular season in October. However, Bear Polo stepped up their game after an additional month of practice.

“I saw everyone there giving everything they could during the game, regardless of whether they were in the pool or not,” senior captain Brooks Saltonstall said.

Big Red lost to Deerfield in the semi-finals after “an exceptionally rough game, [where] they happened to come out on top of us,” Saltonstall said.

Even though Exeter played well and worked hard, the team “couldn’t make it work because our skills didn’t really compliment each other that game,” senior Prin Harinsuta said. “We all wanted do our best and shine, and we all just tried to shoot every time we got the ball.”

Harinsuta believed that if there were more of a team effort, the game could have turned out better.

After that first loss to Deerfield, the team was a bit worried that they would not fare as well in their second game against Suffield. Saltonstall said that to overcome this, the team tried to have “a mentality going into the game of ‘we will not lose, my man will not get the ball,’” which definitely showed throughout their performance against Suffield.

The boys fought hard for the ball in every single possession and played some really tough man-to-man defense. It was this intensity, Saltonstall said, backed up by months of training, which won them the second game. “It was great to see everyone bring it to the game,” he said.

It was because of this attitude that they were able to win, as Suffield was just as determined to get third place.

This was the seniors’ last water polo game representing Exeter, which pushed them even harder.

“On Sunday, we played really well compared to the whole season. We wanted to win because it was the seniors’ last championship game,” Harinsuta said.

“We finished on a high note and we were all in good spirits,” upper Ernesto Brown said.

This year, Bear Polo was a bit of an underdog after graduating many key players, so getting third place was a big accomplishment for them.

“Considering that we have very few seniors on our starting line compared to other years, I am very happy with how we placed,” Saltonstall said. ​