The Bison men’s water polo team had an important series of games this past weekend, facing off against both George Washington and Navy on Saturday before playing Johns Hopkins on Sunday. The Bison came out of the weekend 2-1, putting up wins against GW and Johns Hopkins but losing against Navy by a narrow margin.  

On Saturday morning, the team went up against the George Washington Colonials.  The Colonials took the lead early on, going up 4-1 with 4:29 remaining in the first quarter.  The Bison came back with two points before the end of the first, with both Hasan Mogultay ’25 and Andu Vlasceanu ’24 netting goals to make it 4-3.  The two teams battled through the second quarter until the score was tied at 5-5. Each team scored twice in the final three minutes of the second quarter, with Josh Yardley ’22 scored the remaining two goals for the Bison to tie it up 7-7 at half.  The Orange and Blue dominated in the third quarter, going up 11-7 with goals from Ethan Jones ’24, Jack Lewis ’23, Doruk Ozar ’24, and Vlasceanu.  The Colonials continued to push back in the fourth quarter, challenging the Bison through the end and scoring three more goals.  The score was close, 11-10, with just 2:29 remaining. Keeper Adrien Touzot ’23 stood out with his season-high 12 saves to protect the net for the Bison. The defense held strong and the Bison managed to preserve their lead and score 3 more goals before the end of the match, winning 14-10 against George Washington.  

Later that evening, the Bison men faced off against Navy in a very close match.  Neither the Bison nor the Mids went up by more than three goals at any points throughout this well-matched competition. The first quarter started off very defensive, as each team scored only one goal.  The Bison went up in the second quarter, 4-2, as a result of goals from J. Yardley, Walker Butler ’24, and Vlasceanu.  However, Navy fought back and netted three goals in the last two minutes of the second quarter to make it 5-4 at halftime. In the third quarter, Navy continued to dominate and put up more points, increasing their lead to 7-4.  The Bison fought back, coming within one goal of the Mids lead multiple times, but were ultimately unsuccessful in taking back the lead from their opponents. With about two minutes left in the fourth quarter, the Bison had an exciting opportunity to pull ahead after tying up the game 10-10 with two goals from J. Yardley and Jones.  However, Navy came out triumphant after netting the game-winning goal with about 1:53 remaining in the match, making the score 11-10 in favor of the Mids.  

On Sunday, the team faced off against Johns Hopkins and concluded the weekend with a win. The Bison got on the board first, scoring seven points by five different players in the second quarter: Lewis, J. Yardley, Jones, Mogultay and Ozar. The Blue Jays retaliated with a goal with 4:41 left in the second quarter, but Ozar quickly responded by scoring again to keep the seven-goal lead. Vlasceanu scored twice to end the second quarter, making the score 10-2 by halftime. In the second half, the Bison continued dominating, putting up eight more points to take the game 18-9. There were many contributors to the win, as six different players scored three or more points in this match. Lewis and Vlasceanu both stood out, scoring four goals each to lead the Bison to victory. J. Yardley contributed with three goals and three assists while Touzot put up a season record in saves (for the second day in a row), shutting down 14 shots and adding 2 steals to the scoresheet. 

“This weekend was tough in terms of how much traveling we had to do, but I think we handled it really well. We started off by beating GW – who we lost to at the beginning of the season – so the team was happy that it seems like we are getting better and the things we worked on helped us get that win. At Navy, it was a really great game, going back and forth the whole way… we were a little unlucky to lose by one in the end, but we are looking forward to playing them again so we can rectify that.  And Johns Hopkins was just a good game to end the weekend on a high with a big win before we head to California this weekend,” center defender Liam Stott ’24 said. 

Next weekend, the team looks forward to traveling to California and competing in four games as a part of the Julian Frasier Memorial.