CoachMaxUCLAInsideWater

Staresinic Takes Helm, AQTX Waterpolo Expanding

, , ,

Huge news as we name a new head coach, expand our reach in to Austin, and prepare for next summer (that’s right).

Coach Max Takes Over

We’re excited to announce that Max Staresinic is the new Head Coach of AquaTex Waterpolo Club. He takes over training and programming duties and will be the key voice in articulating and executing our competitive goals (which are ambitious!). You can read his credentials from our announcement that he was joining the club a few weeks ago. The Pittsburgh, PA native played his collegiate ball at UCLA after which he coached both in Pennsylvania and in Southern California.

Barbara (Babs) Lanier will be the Head Coach for all girls’ teams and athletes at AquaTex. Working with Coach Max she’ll lead training and competition for our girls of all ages. She will continue working with our youth boys athletes as well.

Sebastian Houng will be the Head Goalkeeping Coach and will also focus on our 14u/12u athletes.

And we’re fortunate to have Coach Anthony Gerakos with us to assist with – especially – high school-age boys. He just completed a very successful season with our Consolidated High School team.

I will remain the Team Director, focusing on communications, financing, administration, and working with Club Owner Mark Parshall. And I’ll step in to coach at Coach Max’s discretion.

As always we’ll continue to look for new coaching talent, which we hope will be necessary as we continue to grow.

AquaTex Waterpolo is Expanding

AquaTex Waterpolo will be expanding its reach in to Austin. Coach Max is starting water polo programing at Westover Hills Club in Austin in the coming weeks and those athletes will be members of AquaTex Waterpolo. We are already putting together a plan for those athletes who will likely train weeknights at Westover and weekends at Micki with the whole team, and will be on AquaTex’s competitive teams going forward. We are very excited that our reach has expanded, as we’ve hoped for some time, and that the sheer number of athletes taking part in AquaTex water polo under Coach Max’s leadership will increase. It’s a big day for the club as we extend ourselves in to Austin and, hopefully, beyond.

Parent Advisory Board

We have begun recruiting individuals to take part in a new Parent Advisory Board. Several have already committed and we’ll announce the list once everyone who has been invited has had the chance to respond. It is an informal board that will serve Coach Max in helping set the competitive and social priorities for the club. The format is still to be determined but will likely include at a minimum quarterly online meetings (perhaps some in person!).

(Re-) Registration

We have plans for our high school athletes, former and future, who are beginning to return after the end of the second UIL season (with congratulations to all who played UIL water polo in 2023). All lapsed members need to re-register with AquaTex prior to re-starting training. Contact Coach Mark if you have any issues doing so, and please remember that when you register, if you’re in high school or middle school and are NOT slotted for our Novice Waterpolo program, then specifically select “Age Group/High School Waterpolo.” Do not select “High School” or “Junior” which are swim team groups.

Ladies and gents, our aim is to send every possible AquaTex team to California for JOs in 2024. Qualification for those sessions takes place as early as it ever has in early May. The work toward competing next summer begins now. So get registered and get training with our revamped group of talented coaches.

Tournaments

TAGS

The final update regarding this tournament came out this morning. If you are attending be sure to read the important updates about parking limitations and gate entry fees. Good luck to our athletes and Coach Sebastian!

Mavericks Tourney/Armadillo Classic

They keep changing the name and location of this tourney but it’s the first opportunity for our high school athletes to play after the UIL season. 18u and 16u teams only up in The Colony, hosted by the quickly improving Mavericks Club.

Cowtown Stampede

Those who’ve been around a while know we have had some of our biggest successes at this tournament so we expect to end the calendar year with a bang and with lots of teams participating up in Keller in December.

Gear

Finally, a reminder to all our families: an AquaTex competition suit and one AquaTex tee-shirt are required for each athlete, both available year-round in our shop. Coach James has a fitting kit for men’s briefs so please ask to try one one before you purchase if you’d like.

And, as we said earlier, the shop is full of cold weather gear, which we’re going to need as the winter progresses. The deadline to order Printful gear so it arrives prior to Christmas is December 10 for gear produced in US and November 25 for stuff produced in the EU.

Team Rules Update

Though we only announced a new set of team rules in August, they are already in need of some serious revision. Such things as rules regarding suspending your account, annual registration fees, and more do not currently fit with the Club’s requirements. Stay tuned for an update.

So excited for this winter and beyond. See you on the deck.

genericwaterpoloballrightjustified-e1582743816666

AquaTexans Earn UIL All-district Waterpolo Honors

, , ,

Updated, 27 October

Coaches from local UIL districts have selected the 2023 All-Region High School Water Polo teams. We’re exceptionally proud to announce the following current and former AquaTex athletes who were honored by area coaches.

UIL Water Polo 2023 Boys All-District 22 Team

All-District Honorable Mention

  • Rudy-Matheo Garcia, LASA

UIL Water Polo 2023 Girls All-District 21 Team

Most Valuable Player

  • Morgan Spooner, Round Rock HS

All-District First Team

  • Corina Nunziata, Round Rock HS
  • Morgan Spooner, Round Rock HS
  • Erica Campbell, Round Rock HS

All-District Second Team

  • Rachel Delk, Waco Midway HS
  • Molly Arredondo, Round Rock HS
  • Noelle Nealis, Round Rock HS
  • Nichole Wood, Round Rock HS

All-District Honorable Mention

  • Sophia Silvestrini, Round Rock HS

Coach of the Year

  • Tom Arredondo, Round Rock HS

UIL Water Polo 2023 Boys All-District 21 Team

Offensive Player of the Year

  • Gavin Hantelman, Round Rock HS

All-District First Team

  • Gavin Hantelman, Round Rock HS
  • Luca De Araujo, Round Rock HS
  • Declan Graves, Round Rock HS

All-District Second Team

  • James Strauss, Round Rock HS
  • Jake Maness, Waco Midway HS

All-District Honorable Mention

  • Matthew Dixon, Round Rock HS
  • Cody Back, Waco Midway HS

The entire coaching staff congratulates all our athletes – current, former, and future (!) – on another great year of UIL water polo capped by this tremendous list of honorees. We expect to see more in the future as the sport grows. You have done your club proud along with your high school.

You can view the entire lists of outstanding local athletes:

Water Polo District 21 All-District 2023

Water Polo District 22 All-District 2023

FB5FC57A-D25B-4A5C-AD3B-7CE7A4C79CC3_1_102_o

(Another) New Coach, Tourney Recaps, Winter is Near

, , , , ,

(Another) New Coach

Welcome to Max Staresenic, our newest addition to the coaching staff. Coach Max learned how to play water polo in Pittsburgh, enough so to be named Pennsylvania’s high school player of the year before heading off to play at UCLA. Post collegiate career he turned to coaching with Tiger Water Polo in Pennsylvania and the famous Bruin Water Polo Club in LA under UCLA Head Coach Adam Wright. He and his business partner, Jonny Songer (otherwise known as Jonny Rocket of YouTube fame) are also coaching water polo at Westover Country Club in Austin (more about that in the coming days).

Take a moment to say hi next time you can. You can expect to see a lot of Coach Max! Welcome aboard.

Recaps

As the high school season winds down we need to get ready for several upcoming tournaments this winter (our winter season begins November 1). But first…

Alamo Classic

We’re so excited that some of our newest athletes went and competed so well at the Alamo Classic in San Antonio with Coach Sebastian and our friends from Longhorn. Word is that Izzy was dominant for the Longhorn 8th grade girls, Ilay did the same for his 12u team, and our newest athletes, Neel, Preston, Graham, and Jonas were huge contributors to their team after most of them have only about a month of training with AquaTex! And finally, Ilay continues to shine, also dominating for his Longhorn 12u team. We’re so excited to have so many new players competing. Well done to all of them, their Longhorn teammates, and Coach Sebastian.

TISCA Championships

Meanwhile, CenTex Consolidated earned fourth place in the state with a big win over John Paul II in the initial match of the TISCA Consolidated High School Championship Tournament last Saturday, then a close call against Houston Rebels to finish fourth. This ragtag group held it together despite injuries, homecomings, and a short bench. It’s the end of the season for our first ever high school consolidated team so huge congratulations to JP, Chase, Aaron, Jacob, Remy, Cash, William and their teammates from Longhorn and Zilla who joined us. And massive thanks to Coach Anthony who led them the whole way.

Upcoming Competition

You can find these events on our Tourneys page. Be sure to read through them and then sign those kids up!

TAGS (Texas Age Group Championships)

AKA the Texas middle school championships, is now officially on the calendar for November 4-5 in Southlake and Keller. Again, we want a big turnout for this tournament since it marks the end of our Fall season. It’s what we’re training for! It’s for anyone in 8th grade or younger.

Mavericks Tourney

Originally set for San Antonio this tourney had to switch locations to North Texas, November 18-19. This is the first chance for ALL our UIL and CenTex Consolidated athletes to show off those fall-honed skills against all our usual Texas competitors. Coach Max is already excited to get us ready to excel.

Cowtown Stampede

And one of our favorites, a tourney we have done very well at in the past. December 16-17 in Keller featuring all age groups. Let’s finish 2023 with a bang and a huge turnout.

Milestones

Birthdays! We’ve been neglecting them so time to catch up some. Happy birthday (some belated) to:

  • Clayton, 9/13
  • Chase, 10/23
  • Rocco, 9/25
  • Aaron, 10/2

And welcome to the club Dhruv, Andrew, Oliver, Helen, Delton, Aanay, Ada, Annika, Elvis, Kendrick, Jonas, Preston, Margaret! So stoked to have so many newcomers to Swim2Score, and our Age Group/HS programs.

And in case you didn’t already see it, our Jacob Gerakos got some pub in the local Temple newspaper! Way to rep the club and CenTex Consolidated, Jacob.

Gear

A couple gear reminders: thanks to our newcomers who have already purchased the required gear. To those who haven’t yet, each athlete is required to have one “uniform” t-shirt, and one competition suit. You can find all the eligible uniform items here.

Plus, the weather is (finally) getting colder. For all our shivering athletes and parents on the deck check out our cold weather gear: parkas, hoodies, sweats, and probably more soon, like sweatpants. As always, if you have a product you think would look good in AquaTex colors let us know.

Camps & Clinics

Nominations are open for the 2023 Holiday Camp in Colorado. It’s a great chance for any of our athletes in 8th grade to work with some of the best coaches in the US and train with players from all over the country. You can find details here but be sure to let Coach James know if you’d like to attend because you can only do so with a nomination from you coach. If you’re interested you’ll definitely be nominated.

More soon but until then, see you on the deck.

IMG_1379

New Coaches, New Athletes, New Competition

, , , , ,

It’s September and aside from the weather it seems like a new beginning for the club. Some important updates for everyone as we welcome a new season with lots of new faces.

New Coaches

We want to welcome four people to the coaching ranks. Sebastian Houng is our newest hire. He comes from Diamond Bar High School in SoCal where he was a record-setting goalkeeper prior to earning a spot at West Point, where he played and coached water polo. He’s now serving in the US Army in Austin.

Anthony Gerakos has graciously joined us to help with our Consolidated HS team in particular. He is another SoCal native who played at Indio High School and now lives in Belton with some young man named Jacob (a long-time member of the club for those who didn’t already know!).

Akriti Mandal and Kailee Seto are AquaTex athletes who join Corina Nunziata as coaches with our Swim2Score program under Coach Babs. All of them have been terrific additions to the staff. Just ask the youngsters who work with them!

Welcome aboard, all of you, and thank you for your dedication.

New Athletes/Families

It’s been a banner fall for the club with a host of new families. It’s an exciting time for the club with the influx of new, young faces. We’re excited to start competing with all of them. Welcome to all of you, and to those yet to join us (we hope you will). Here are a few things for you and for our veteran families.

Parent Meeting

You can plan on an invitation to an online parent meeting in the coming weeks. We have a lot of new faces as part of the program, and lots of veterans as well. We need to share important information about how the club works: competition, communications, training, finances, etc. If you have a topic you want covered be sure to contact Coach James. Very tentatively we’ll put it on the calendar for Thursday, September 21 at 7:00 PM. More to come.

Communications

A quick reminder especially to our newcomers: because we’re part of AquaTex Swim Team you can expect to get emails from Coaches Mark and Marcy that are intended for swim families but not necessarily for water polo families. The emails that pertain specifically to AquaTex Waterpolo will either come from or from an email with aquatexwaterpolo.com domain. In response to an email regarding USA Swimming registration someone asked if that was relevant to water polo families. It is not but if you have any doubts please do contact me.

Roster Calls

You can find these events on our Tourneys page. And for those who might ask, we are trying very hard to field our own teams from now on. I’ve mentioned it many times: we are very pleased with our relationship with Longhorn. And we will continue to communicate with them about fielding joint teams if neither club has enough for its own. But let’s plan on working toward fielding AquaTex-only rosters as much as possible going forward.

The Alamo Classic for 14u athletes is on October 7-8 in San Antonio and we do plan on sending AquaTex teams (12u and 10u in particular). This will be the first competition for many of our athletes, which we’re really excited about. We expect a big turnout so sign up today.

The Team Vegas Founders Cup will be our first ever trip to Nevada. As of now our plans are to take that same 14u team that competed in California at JOs this past summer. Every one of those athletes, except one (!), is eligible. I would like to have a team of 10 athletes committed to travel and play at that tournament by September 22 so we can officially enter. The deadline is October 1 but the tournament is filling up quickly. The sooner we can rally the sooner we can register. So start bugging each other via GroupMe! And, of course, if there are sufficient numbers of 12u athletes then we’ll sign them up too.

TAGS (Texas Age Group Championships), AKA the Texas middle school championships, is now officially on the calendar for November 4-5 in Southlake and Keller. Again, we want a big turnout for this tournament since it marks the end of our Fall season. It’s what we’re training for!

Camps & Clinics

ODP

I’m delighted to hear how many of our families are interested in or already registered to participate in ODP (USA Water Polo’s Olympic Development Program). For our newcomers, you can read more about what ODP is here. Maybe even more important, here is when and where the camps are taking place and for which age groups.

I was the head coach of the Southwest Zone Boys for eight great years so I have a high opinion of the program. Feel free to ask questions about it if you have any. I plan to attend the Cadet Camp #1 at the RRAC on September 17, and I encourage our coaches to do the same. There are some great opportunities to learn from other coaches.

The Perfect Goalie Camp

On September 16 Team USA goalie coach Michael Zellmer will be in Houston conducting two back-to-back goalie clinics. Our goalies are encouraged to attend. And we’ll definitely keep an eye open for other goalie-training opportunities in Texas.

CenTex Consolidated

Our consolidated team has a big weekend ahead with games at the RRAC against both consolidated and UIL teams (exhibitions!). Also, we are looking in to hosting a scrimmage day with other consolidated teams at the end of September. Stay tuned.

See you on the deck.

E1DC90C2-A6F7-479D-907A-8578B32F1DF2_1_105_c

JOs are Done and Fall is Here

, , , , , ,

The Fall is here. How do we know? Well, JOs are over, coaches are scattered, and the high school athletes are already in the pool for their season. We have several things to cover so, let’s go!

JOs Session 3

We will have more to say, I think, about Session 3 over time but it was a phenomenal end to another historic season for the club. Suffice it to say, we sent Alon off with an 18u boys team that earned a spot in the platinum division, another first for AquaTex. Huge thanks to him, Coach Matt, all our fantastic supportive parents, and to the players for working hard at the biggest tournament in the world.

Meanwhile, Morgan and Corina made their mark for Longhorn’s 18u girls team, which finished with a record of 3-5 which placed them 7th in the gold division. Coach Evan paid big compliments saying that Morgan was the, “stable core to our offense, consistently generating goals from counterattacks and drives. And then, in their final game the team experienced a “Corinasance!”

For about 45 minutes the world stood still as we bore witness to the “Corinasance”. Corina scored goal after goal from set, bringing us into a close shootout in an otherwise unfavorable game. This again spoke toward the team’s adaptability. It was exciting to watch the team grow over such a short period of time, and we look forward to what they will accomplish in the coming year.

Well done by them, their Longhorn teammates, and Evan and his coaching staff.

Izzy turned some heads, including this coach’s, with an outstanding performance for Alamo Area Green 16u girls. Not only was she the most conspicuous thief, she shut down defenders on the perimeter, and scored at least one counterattack goal that I saw. AAAA parents LOVED having her on the team, which makes me a proud as anything. Congratulations Izzy!

Finally, our three 10u athletes, Ryan, Grey, and Emeric, were huge contributors to the Longhorn’s top-four Platinum finish. Grey has become an offensive juggernaut, while Ryan and Emeric played “tenacious” defense according to Coach Cole.

Again, a huge year for the club punctuated by our biggest presence ever at Junior Olympics. Let’s do it all again soon, right?

But first: Declan inspired by Shieldy blasts a fast 12.5 to win the sprint!

And finally, sadly, we want to say goodbye to Riley Dixon, Liam Graves, Vitalik Pavlenko, and Coach Alon (though he may come back on occasion). It’s always hard to see our athletes graduate and move on but having known all of them has made the club better and this coach happier. I’ll miss y’all.

The Fall

Training Schedule

Here we go. The fall practice schedule is now available on our Calendar page: Monday, Wednesday, Saturday, Sunday. Please go read the details.

Re-registration

Not all the registration costs are correct so if you are registering for Novice Waterpolo, Swim2Score, or masters waterpolo please wait. High School and Age Group Waterpolo are correctly priced so proceed.

Speaking of fees, they have gone up as you’ll notice but are still extremely competitive with other clubs’. That, and re-registration fees will now be $150. If you suspend your account (with some exceptions) you can expect to pay the $150 fee after returning to training. More below.

Newcomers

We are extremely excited to have at least 20 young athletes express interest in our Swim2Score, Novice, and Age Group water polo training. We expect to meet them all during evaluations on Sunday, August 13 at 10 AM and/or Saturday, August 19 (when we return to our typical Saturday evaluations).

Coaches

Speaking of newcomers, we want to welcome Brandon Molina. He will begin his coaching trial with us on August 13. Brandon was a member of the best high school water polo team I’ve ever seen: Mater Dei from Santa Ana, CA in the early 2010s and then coached at two big youth programs in SoCal: Bruin, and United. Welcome to Brandon!

Contract

Note that we now require each family that (re-)registers with the club to agree to a Player/Team/Parent contract. You can read and sign it now even prior to registering. An electronically signed version of this contract will be required from each family upon registration.

Account Suspensions

Also note in the contract that there are new rules for any temporary suspension or termination of an athlete’s AquaTex account. For those high school athletes who are suspending their accounts until November in order to play UIL-sponsored water polo, please fill out this form. Each of those athletes will be automatically re-instated on November 1.

CenTex Consolidated

We’re on the calendar for the Round Rock HS Polo Fest, September 8-9. Read all about it here! You can see the roster as currently constituted but we will expect to add a few Zilla athletes as well who need a team to play for.

The schedule for our Consolidated team is a work in progress but we can plan on taking part in the TISCA High School Championships in San Antonio, October 13-14. Definitely more to come.

That’s all… for now.

 

0A29BBAD-87E7-4BDF-8AD1-7322E1071D97_1_105_c

Pre-JOs Session 3 Update, Summer Break, Fall Scheduling

, , ,

AquaTexans, we have arrived at the end of our training year. A few things regarding Session 3 of Junior Olympics and about resuming activities in August. Please give it a read whether you’re heading to Session 3 or not. Plus…

JOs Session 1

Our 14u boys ended an historic Junior Olympic tournament in Southern California with 3 wins an 4 losses, plus a ton of interesting stories, probably sunburn, and some great memories. Check out these great photos from their time in SoCal. Congratulations to them, Coaches Babs and Savvy, and our great families who went to support them.

JOs Session 3

The schedule is out. Our 18u boys play at 7:30 AM on Thursday, July 27 at Keller ISD Natatorium. Find its exact location, along with all other sites, on our Location Map. For those playing for AAAA and Longhorn make sure you are checking in with those coaches regarding when you’re supposed to meet prior to your games.

We will attempt to keep everyone informed during the tournament via our GroupMe’s and on the Event Page.

Good luck to everyone participating and make sure to share any photos or game film with us. We’ll use it for Instagram and we’ll create a shared folder on the interweb where all of them will be kept for posterity.

IDs

USA Water Polo will be checking the identity of each athlete prior to games and requires a physical photo ID of everyone. The ID can be your USAWP ID card, a drivers license, official state ID card, school ID card, passport. You can also download a photo ID with your USAWP membership. This only takes 1-2 minutes and can be done from a phone. Login to your account at the USAWP website and then click the blank profile picture to download a photo ID. Step by Step Instructions on How to Update USAWP Membership Photo.

Team Dinner

All our athletes and families are expected to attend a team dinner at Black Walnut Cafein Coppell at 6:00 7:00 PM [we pushed the time back to allow more people to show up] on Wednesday, July 26. We’ve reserved a large room and plan on a couple announcements there, including a farewell to Coach Alon. For those new to it, it is a seated restaurant but each person orders at a counter.

Fall Training Schedule

Our practice on Tuesday, July 25 is the last one of the summer and marks the end of the 2022-23 club water polo season. We will take a well-deserved break after JOs Session 3 and then resume training on Sunday, August 13. That includes all training: Swim2Score, age group, high school, and novice. The detailed fall schedule will be out soon. We’ll see you again in August.

Re-registration

All AquaTex members are “terminated/suspended” at the end of July each year, and are then required to re-register via the Team Unify site on or after August 1. Many of you are quite familiar with this but we also have some newcomers who may not be aware of it. Given our post-JOs break you will have until the weekend of August 12 do so but make sure you’re properly registered prior to attending training on the 13th.

Contract

Note that we now require each family that (re-)registers with the club to agree to a Player/Team/Parent contract. Take the time to review the draft of it now. An electronically signed version of this contract will be required from each family upon registration.

Account Suspensions

Also note in the contract that there are new rules for any temporary suspension or termination of an athlete’s AquaTex account. For those high school athletes who are suspending their accounts until November in order to play UIL-sponsored water polo, please fill out this form. Each of those athletes will be automatically re-instated on November 1.

It’s been a great year. Thank you everyone for making it the best we’ve ever had at AquaTex Waterpolo. And the future is bright. We’ll see you at JOs and then in August.

James

POM Banner

Reinhold Karvenz, June Player of the Month

It seems like Rein joined us just a couple weeks ago! Time flies and Rein has attracted the attention of AquaTex coaches with his willingness to compete, learn, and take part in practice… often! Plus, he’s done well in translating his competitive nature (it shows he’s a lacrosse player!) in to tactical skill. For that and much more he’s our June 2023 Player of the Month. Congratulations, Rein!

sime-basioli-BRkikoNP0KQ-unsplash

July Training Update

,

Between July 10 and August 1, 2023 the updated training schedule for AquaTex Waterpolo is:

High School Waterpolo Training Group

  • Tuesday 7:00 – 9:00 PM
  • Wednesday 7:15 – 9:15 PM
  • Saturday: 10 AM – noon
  • Sunday: 10 AM – noon

Age Group Waterpolo Training Group

  • Tuesday 7:00 – 9:00 PM
  • Wednesday 7:15 – 9:15 PM
  • Saturday: 10 AM – noon
  • Sunday: 10 AM – noon

Novice Waterpolo Training Group

  • Tuesday 7:00 – 8:00 PM
  • Wednesday 7:15 – 8:15 PM
  • Saturday: 10 AM – 11:00 AM
  • Sunday: 10 AM – 11:00 AM

Swim2Score

  • Sunday 10 AM – 11 AM

Masters

  • Will resume after August 12

August Training

After Session 3 of Junior Olympics we will take a break. There will be no official training between August 1-11. (Coaches may announce pop-up practices during that period). We’ll plan to resume in full on Saturday, August 12. The fall schedule will resemble last year’s taking UIL water polo in to account.

August 1 Re-registration

A reminder that every member of AquaTex is required to re-register every August 1. This year each family will be required to read and sign a Player/Team/Parent Contract before their registration is approved (a draft of which is viewable here). There are new rules regarding families who want to temporarily suspend their membership, clarification of such things as practice/competition expectations and uniform requirements, and personal conduct rules.

valencia-high-school-water-polo-generic-e1457032570911

CenTex Consolidated HS Team July Update

, , , ,

To those who’ve indicated at least some interest in participating in our consolidated high school team effort this fall, here’s our first update. We’re calling it the Central Texas Consolidated High School Waterpolo team. We’re starting to solidify our plans since there is big interest in fielding consolidated teams from Dallas to Austin to Houston, which is great news for our athletes who want to play high school water polo this fall but don’t have a UIL team to play for. Here’s a brief update on what you can expect based on what we know so far.

First, if you know of any other athletes looking for a team please ask them to fill out this form and/or contact me.

Participating Teams

  • CenTex Consolidated boys (AquaTex)
  • Dallas Consolidated boys (Pegasus)
  • Houston Rebels Consolidated boys (Viper Pigeons)
  • Cedar Park HS Club boys (Zilla)
  • Zilla girls
  • Zilla boys

Our roster, in general

  • Aaron Gordon, Vandegrift
  • Cash Brown, Vista Ridge
  • Jacob Gerakos, Lake Belton
  • Jackson Place, Vista Ridge
  • Chase Wadley, East View
  • Tristan Chamas, Vandegrift
  • Ava Chamas, Vandegrift
  • Santhiago Márquez, Cedar Park
  • William Lunsford, McNeil
  • Cayden Maguire, Vandegrift
  • August Nordstedt, St. Andrew’s
  • Kaden Wiggans, home school

Competition Schedule

We are fortunately already on the calendar for a tournament in Round Rock (at the RRAC) on September 8-9. The teams involved in that tourney are, tentatively:

  • Round Rock
  • Westlake (Boys only)
  • Anderson
  • Austin
  • Westwood
  • Hays
  • Lehman
  • Waco Midway (Friday Only)
  • Alamo Heights (Friday only)
  • Canyon
  • CenTex Consolidated (Boys Only)
  • Houston Rebels Consolidated (Boys Only)

The format of the tourney is TBD but you can likely expect it to be in festival format. That is, 2-3 games, no championship bracket.

As for the rest of the fall schedule, please review it via this calendar. Events prefaced with a question mark are placeholders for now. The schedule has generally been compiled in a way that keeps other events in mind (SATs, USAWP tourneys, etc.). But if you are aware of any conflicts let me know. As you’ll see we should expect to travel to Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio for weekend tournaments.

Training

First, since we have athletes from a couple different clubs, your athlete’s priority is to continue practicing with them through the fall. As for AquaTex’s high school training schedule this fall, it is still tentative but athletes can expect something like monday and wednesday evenings; saturday and sunday mornings, with weekend practices being the most important for this program so we can get as many athletes training together as possible. So, in general, we’d strongly suggest attending your primary club practices on weeknights, and then heading to Micki Krebsbach on weekends for training. We will obviously not train on days when we are competing.

Communications

We’ve set up a GroupMe already that we’ll begin using more regularly. If you haven’t joined please do and add your athletes since it will be a family-friendly communications group (email me for the link to the group). If you’re unfamiliar with GroupMe, you can opt-out any time.

I’ve also used an email communications tool formerly knows as Sendinblue, now known as Brevo. You will likely receive email from that service in the future so let it thru those spam filters! Again, you can opt-out of that mailing list at any time.

Gear

Plans are to have a team tee-shirt available for online purchase very soon. We can add other gear as well based on your input.

Ordering team suits is possible but getting late. We have two vendors in mind: RYTE Sport can do one-off suit ordering directly to your preferred address in two weeks or so. The other, CounterPolo, is very inexpensive, has high quality suits, but only allows bulk orders and has a two month wait time. So, our athletes are welcome, even encouraged to wear their club OR former high school team suits to better shame those programs for no longer offering water polo… We’ll be using some pretty generic, unbranded competition caps, FYI.

Coaches

I’m planning on heading up this team this fall but, time permitting, will be encouraging our coaches Barbara Lanier and Matt Braun to help as well. They are both highly experienced coaches with Division I playing experience. Coach Babs led a high school team in Michigan and Matt was a certified youth coach in the UK where he played professionally.

That’s all for now. It’s an exciting time for our high school athletes and we’re looking forward to working with you to make the fall a great one.

IMG_1186

Pre-JOs Competition, Longhorn Scrimmages, JOs

, , , ,

Let’s catch up.

Roster Calls

We are not sending any teams to the Endless Summer Classic but will instead shift our focus to the Sun’s out Guns out Tournament in Pearland and Cypress, July 8-9. It is the last chance for us to compete prior to JOs so our 14u and 18u boys teams in particular are expected to play. As usual, our athletes can play on select Longhorn rosters if there is no AquaTex team for them this tournament. Read more details on SOGO here.

Longhorn Friday Scrimmages

Longhorn has invited our teams to scrimmage them at UT on the next two Fridays, June 23 and June 30. On the 23rd it’ll be for our 14u athletes. On the 30th it’ll be a high school-age scrimmage. Again, we’re doing what we can to get as much competitive experience before we head off to JOs. All athletes are required to have this form signed, printed, and presented to the people working the front desk on the day of the scrimmage. Don’t forget!

Junior Olympics

It’s just a couple weeks away, unbelievably. Some reminders and some new info:

14u Boys

Coaches Babs and Savvy will be traveling with the 14u boys team to California. The unofficial team hotel is the Delta Hotels Anaheim Garden Grove. Coach Babs may expect athletes to meet some time the afternoon/evening of Friday, July 14 to distribute bag tags and discuss expectations for the tournament. She’ll make that call via GroupMe. Regardless, athletes are expected to be at the first game of the day one hour prior. Expect games to begin early on Saturday, July 15 and will run all the way through Tuesday, July 18, so be sure to plan on it.

There is a JOs expo on the 14th where there will be a lot of booths, probably some colleges recruiting, and speakers. You can find the general agenda on USA Water Polo’s JOs site.

We’re also looking for a family or families who might be interested in opening up their home for a final carb-loading session (really an excuse to eat spaghetti) prior to both teams heading to JOs. Contact Coach James or Babs if you’d be willing (date TBD).

18u Boys

Coaches Alon and Matt are leading the charge with our 18s in Dallas. There will be a team dinner on Wednesday, July 26 at the Black Walnut Cafe in Coppell. All athletes and families should plan on attending as we prepare for the tournament and say so-long to Alon.

Gear

A reminder that our special 2023 JOs tee-shirt is available in our shop, including a youth size version. Order one of those and lots of other great stuff (those Arena backpacks look fantastic) to show off at competitions this summer.

New and Returning Athletes

Miriam, who’s 11, gave us a try last Sunday and plans to join us soon – very exciting. And Kyle has joined us permanently as well while Alex has returned after a hiatus. Welcome (back) to all of them!

Speaking of Alex, Happy Birthday! She’s our only athlete born in June.

May POM

Elliot Bronshteyn is the choice of AquaTex Waterpolo coaches for May Player of the Month. If you haven’t already check it out. Well done, Elliot.

CenTex Consolidated High School Team

A reminder that we’re going to attempt to field a team of high schoolers this fall who do not have a UIL team to play for. And, the good news is that Houston will also be fielding a consolidated team in addition to the one in Dallas. So there’s competition to be had for those who want it. If you haven’t already, fill out this form to show your interest, and please do share it with anyone you know who wants to play high school water polo this fall.

See you on the deck (soon).

Load More