The wind wasn’t strong, but it was enough to chill Lake Howell’s swimming pool, the setting for the district semifinals. The girls water polo team came in as the underdogs, but that did not faze senior Sofia Galiano, who scored most of the points in the game.

On March 29, girls water polo competed in the district semifinals against Lake Howell. The team would fall 15-4 with Galiano’s three goals, finishing the season 3-19. 

The team didn’t hit their stride for the majority of the season, losing 16 of their games before winning one. After they won the first game of the season, the team started to come together, ending up winning three out of their last four games before the playoffs began. The games were 

Winter Springs with a score of 11-3, Colonial with a score of 9-8, and Timber Creek.

Throughout the season, the team struggled to put up points but toward the end, the offense did improve. In their best game and first win of the season against Timber Creek, the team scored 20 behind senior Alexane Ayup with six and Galiano with seven. The team only allowed four points in the matchup.

“It gave more of a morale boost than anything because our new girls had never felt that winning feeling. It helped us push through the last stretch of the 23 games we played,” sophomore Eleanor Russo said.

Seniors take up the majority of the roster,and  the team’s reliance on seniors has always been a concern. As they leave each year, inexperienced underclassmen have been forced to step up earlier than expected.

“I think our biggest breaking point was our lack of defensive work,” Russo said. “We spent the whole week working offense when realistically, we should have been running defense as well.”

With a majority sophomore roster coming into next year, the team’s youth will give them room for improvement and experience. The entire team, even the coaches who have only been coaching for two years, are young with every year giving everyone more experience and things to improve on.

“The loss is going to be a big building block, considering the outcome of last year’s district, we lost four of our best seniors and we are losing six more this year,” Russo said. “I think it’s good motivation and my responsibility to train the new team next year.”