If you only scrimmaged the varsity but never played in a game, you will appreciate my suppressed regret.
I was a swim team “scrub” for our Longhorn water polo team. Skinny, 145-pounds, I wasn’t much opposition for the big-shouldered varsity brutes who practiced their underwater demolition tactics on me.
Water polo is a contact sport, but two-dimensional. Little contact above water. By rules, only the goalie can catch with two hands. The other six men pass one-handed. Their defender can use both hands to push them under. Unseen, underwater, stomach, lower limbs, manhood all become targets the referee can’t see to protect from opponent’s knees and feet.
My big water polo moment came in 1946 intramural water polo. Our Nimrod Hunting and Fishing Club recruited a team. Only seven volunteered for the team. I coached. Chose Ward to play ‘goalie.’ He had catcher-mitt hands. Although Ward could barely swim, he could hold unto the cage.
Alas. only six Nimrods showed for our first game against the Physical Education Majors (PEM) Club team. They brought a dozen, most of them swimmers from the varsity water polo team.
“Okay. You only have six. We will only play six at a time,” their brute of a captain told me.
Here’s a short play-by-play: first PEM Club shot caught by goalie. Ward throws to Elam. Elam throws ball past their goalie. Nimrods lead 1-0.
Even without wearing my glasses, I could see that at the other end of the pool, a seventh varsity swimmer joined their team. Atop water, two guarded me. Below water—described above. Nimrods scored no more goals.
Maybe my ‘scrub’ regret has spilled into my thriller sequel manuscripts.
The 1984 Olympics Water Polo Championship was fought in the Pepperdine University Malibu pool. Although I later spent a semester as a visiting professor, I never swam there.
But in my fictional 1984 novel, character Bill Havins attends because he’s an honored water polo All-American.
Image by Matthias Lemm from Pixabay
