The University of Washington Women's Water Polo team is a highly-competitive club sports program that trains throughout the year and is open to all currently enrolled undergraduate and graduate students.  The team is overseen by the UW Club Sports office who provides partial funding to the program with the rest coming from fundraising and individual player dues. 

 

For those not looking at competing in NCAA, the UW women's club team is a great opportunity to play water polo at the next level. Practice obligations range between 5-9 hours per week while the team trains from September - May. The official season begins in Winter quarter but there are tournaments the team travels to throughout the year and includes competition in California, Oregon, Canada and Washington. 

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

The UW Huskies compete in the Northwest Division of the Collegiate Water Polo Association (CWPA), who oversees collegiate club water polo for over 112 universities across 15 divisions. Each division holds three tournaments including a divisional championship. The winner of each divisional championship competes at the National Championships along with the host school of that year's host division. The Huskies currently compete in the Northwest Division where they haven't lost since January 2016 and has claimed the division MVP four years in a row. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Practice Format

>30 minutes warm-up and conditioning

• Including swimming, leg work and passing

>30-40 minutes of passing and shooting drills

• Including individual offensive and defensive drills, 6 on 5 offense and defense drills

>30 minutes of counterattack drills

• One-way counters, 3-way counter drills

>30-40 minutes of controlled scrimmage, game situations

• Counterattack scrimmage, zone defense only, man-up, normal scrimmage, etc.

 

The team also dedicates one practice a week to scrimmaging against a women's masters team made up of mostly players who competed at the NCAA level. It has been a great opportunity to play a strong group and learn new skills in the process.

 

The program has a slightly different philosophy than most other programs. Rather than doing long swim sets and movements unrelated to polo, the heart of the training lies in combining multiple movements into each drill with an emphasis in quick water polo swimming and high intensity intervals. Therefore you will never do beyond 1500 yds of just lap swim in any practice.

 

Experience 

All UW students are welcomed to join but it is highly encouraged to have previous water polo experience, or at the very least, experience as a competitive swimmer. If you are unsure, things you can do to test yourself are:

1. Swim your fastest 25 yds (one lap) in 17 seconds or less.

2. Swim your fastest 50 yds in 40 seconds. or less.

3. Tread water continuously for 10 minutes.

 

Interested players should fill out the Propective Player Questionnaire and can contact head coach, Rudy Ramirez at info@uwwaterpolo.com for any questions.